by Lufthansa Flyer | Dec 9, 2014 | Airports, Featured, Frankfurt, Photography, Plane Spotting |
On a recent trip to Frankfurt for a bit of LH business and to attend the FlyerTalk / Vielfliegertreff ‘Advent-DO’, I made sure to block out several hours in my calendar for spotting. Fortunately, ‘FRA’ is very ‘Spotter friendly’ and provides 3 dedicated areas designed to maximize quality spotting opportunities. The three include the observation deck in Terminal 2 (currently closed as part of a renovation to the food court area) and 2 spotting venues located at strategic points just outside the Airport’s fence.
One of these venues is located on the east side of the airport next to the Berlin Airlift Memorial which gives visitors a great vantage point for arrivals coming from the east. The other venue, ‘Affenfelsen’ (Monkey’s Rock?), is a spotting platform that puts you next to the North/South runway that is dedicated only for departing flights. Another advantage of the Affenfelsen site is its proximity to the East/West runways which allows you to capture flights arriving from the west.
For the 2 days that I had time for spotting, I chose the Affenfelsen site since it is easy to access from the airport and provides 2 runways worth of activity. To reach this spot, you simply take the Holiday Parking shuttle from Terminal 1 or 2 to the Holiday Parking Lot located near Affenfelsen. You’ll need to take a 15 minute walk from the parking lot, but its worth that minor effort.
Due to the amount of photos, I’ll publish a few posts to cover the 2 days. Weather on day 1 was overcast with low ceilings and mist that made it a bit challenging, however day 2 made up for it with clear and crisp skies. All of the photos that you’ll see are taken with a Nikon D800 attached to Sigma’s new 150-600mm Super Telephoto lens (click for lens review post). This was the first time I put this lens to use and it performed brilliantly. Even at 600mm and free hand, images were still sharp and ‘usable’! Enjoy!
Click Here to visit my Plane Spotting Archives
AirBridge Cargo 747-8F
Air France’s new HOP! regional ERJ 190
Speedbird’s A321 taxis to a mid-runway departure position
Perhaps the most peculiar sighting that I’ve ever made at Frankfurt. This China Southern ERJ 145 (along with 5 others) had recently been sold to a Russian start up and have yet to be repainted. So no, this ERJ is not flying to Beijing!
No mistaking this Etihad A340 sporting the beautiful F1 livery.
‘Siegerflieger’ was nearly a mile away. It took every bit of the lens’ 600mm to bring this beauty closer!
What is becoming an endangered species, this LH 737 is preparing to depart from a mid-runway position. LH will be retiring the rest of their 737s during 2015.
Yankee Papa, the 1500th 747 to be built by Boeing, is arriving from the west.
‘Yankee Quebec’ is Lufthansa’s newest 747-8i. It was delivered to the airline in August 2014.
Lufthansa’s D-AILF, an A319, rotates for a perfect photo…..
Another LH A319 departing FRA….there would be a few dozen of these! 🙂
Lufthansa Cargo’s ‘Charlie Lima’ arrives from the west during the late afternoon.
TAM’s 777 arriving from Brazil
Thomas Cook’s 767 begins her take off roll…..
Turkish Cargo A330-200 Freighter
Ukraine International’s 737 arriving from Kiev
by Lufthansa Flyer | Oct 16, 2014 | Featured, Frankfurt, Lufthansa, Plane Spotting |
Two weeks ago, I was flying from Michigan to Johannesburg via Chicago and Frankfurt which created a very nice and lengthy layover in Frankfurt between my inbound flight from the US and connecting flight to JNB. This routing gave me a unique opportunity take in plane spotting at night when Lufthansa sends a few of their long haulers to Asia and Africa.
On typical trips, I arrive in FRA during early morning hours and my departures for the States typically take place by early afternoon. Having a 10:00p departure from FRA gave me an opportunity to see LH aircraft in a different light, or lack thereof….
While waiting for 10p to roll around, I ‘abandoned’ my wife to the capable hands of the Senator Lounge and set out to walk the length of Concourse Z which is typically where you’ll find most of LH’s long haul activity, especially at night. Fortunately the glass was clean enough and glare was manageable so that the pictures actually turned out quite well.
Enjoy!
747-8i, D-ABYL, ahead of her flight to Hong Kong
Another look at ‘Yankee Lima’
D-AISL, an Airbus A321, would head to Amman, Jordan
D-AISR, an Airbus A321, would head off to Bucharest, Romania.
D-AIGO, an Airbus A343, would head off to Qingdao-Shenyang
This would be our ride to Johannesburg. ‘D-AIMB’ aka Munchen is an Airbus A380, and is outfitted with the fantastic new Business cabin…..
Another look at ‘Michael Bravo’
D-AIMF, or ‘Zurich’ would head to Singapore.
by Lufthansa Flyer | Sep 21, 2014 | Cargo, Featured, Frankfurt, Lufthansa |
If you caught my previous post regarding ‘SAVING THE DATE’ for a great 2-3 days in Frankfurt over Thanksgiving Weekend, you’ll recall that I mentioned I was working on confirming the details for a tour of LH’s Cargo Facility. If you missed that post, click on the link to get caught up!
Well that confirmation has arrived and LUFTHANSA CARGO has invited us to their facility for a detailed look at their operation. As a bonus to the tour and based on their current aircraft timetable, we’ll also have the ability to visit the apron and get up close to one of their 777F freighters that have been added to the fleet this year.
The Cargo Tour will be limited to only 20 people due to security logistics and a limit on how many people can be on an active ramp at the same time. On my last visit to Cargo, I had a chance to be in the cargo hold of an MD11-F during loading and I can see why only a few people can be allowed near the aircraft during loading.
The tour will take place Friday, November 28 in the afternoon and will dove tail nicely with the other events that are planned for the weekend. As of now, there will be a tour of Lufthansa’s Technik hangars which may include boarding a 747-8i to see the new Premium Economy seats being introduced in a few weeks. There are other events planned for the weekend as well.
A tour of Cargo is usually difficult to arrange due to the nature of their business, so we’re fortunate that they agreed to host us for a few hours. I expect sign up for this event to be completed quickly once registration for the events open in the coming weeks.
At the risk of self-promotion, you may want to follow me on twitter at @LufthansaFlyer so you’ll know immediately when sign-up is open for the events. You can also get the latest news from VFT’s thread dedicated to the event.
by Lufthansa Flyer | Sep 17, 2014 | Cargo, Featured, Frankfurt, Lufthansa, Technik, Travel |
Should your calendar allow you to be in Frankfurt at the end of November, please join us for the annual ‘Advent-DO’!
The event, organized by Ralf Schumann of VielFliegerTreff.com & SkyTravelAgent.de (Mileage Run Specialist!) , welcomes anyone with an interest to spend time with other Frequent Travelers and enjoy a few days in Frankfurt.
This year’s tentative itinerary is excellent and promises to deliver a great time. Among the events we expect to take place:
FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 28:
A round-table discussion with members of Lufthansa’s management team.
Cargo Tour – I am currently working to confirm the details with Cargo for a rare behind the scenes tour of Cargo, including access to the apron for an up close look at MD11 and 777 Freighters.
SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 29:
LUFTHANSA Technik: A great behind the scenes tour of Lufthansa’s aircraft engineering & maintenance division. Visits to a variety of hangars will provide up close access to a variety of different LH aircraft. The tours will be given in German & English.
Premium Economy Preview: We hope to have an opportunity to board a 747-8i to experience Lufthansa’s newest cabin product first hand!
After the tours, we’ll gather for cocktails and dinner and take in the open of the Advent / Christmas Markets in Frankfurt.
SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 30:
Brunch (Location to be determined).
Please keep in mind that this itinerary is still tentative while we wait for Lufthansa to confirm the details. I suspect that this event should have its agenda finalized in the next couple of weeks. Additionally, some of the tour components of the event may have limits as to how many people can participate due to logistics, security, etc. So it’s important to sign up early once ‘registration’ opens.
I’ll provide an update letting you know when ‘Sign Up’ officially opens. You can also keep tabs on the event by visiting the VielFliegerTreff thread for this event. At some point there will also be a thread started in FlyerTalk’s Community Buzz Forum.
If you have any questions regarding the event, please let me know by leaving a comment.
by Lufthansa Flyer | Sep 15, 2014 | Airports, Featured, Frankfurt, Lufthansa |
A week can’t go by without a strike apparently…..
The union representing Lufthansa’s pilots has called yet another strike that is set to take place on Tuesday, September 16 in Frankfurt. According to the information that I am seeing, the strike will take place between 8am and 4pm. It appears that all flights will be cancelled including long haul flights into and out of Frankfurt during that time frame.
According to LH, they plan to present their latest proposal in ending the strike before the walk out is set to begin on Tuesday, so there is a chance, albeit it a small one, that the walk out could be averted on Tuesday.
To check if your flight will be affected, please use this link and check it often as Lufthansa will update it on a regular basis.
