All Nippon Airways Boeing 767-300ER lands at YVR on Sunday afternoon – Photo: Leighton Matthews | Pacific Air Photo
ANA – All Nippon Airways’ first scheduled flight to Canada landed at Vancouver International Airport (YVR) on Sunday afternoon. The arrival of the Boeing 767-300ER from Tokyo International Airport – Haneda (HND) ushered in the option of a new airline and new destination airport for Tokyo-bound passengers who originate or connect in YVR.
Located on Tokyo Bay, Haneda airport is a short 15-minute train or monorail ride for passengers to connect to Tokyo’s extensive transit system. Haneda was relegated to domestic flights in the late 1970’s, when Narita International Airport (NRT) opened to serve international traffic. Although a new express train now serves distant Narita, many consider traveling between downtown Tokyo and NRT to be a time-consuming and expensive ordeal.
Looking to return HND to its previous status as Tokyo’s convenient gateway, a new International Terminal was opened in 2010. Initially, international flights were limited, and slot-restricted to middle-of-the-night arrivals, which wasn’t particularly appealing to passengers or airlines. Fortunately, HND opened up daytime slots in 2014, most beginning this week. ANA’s YVR-HND route is just one of many new international flights serving the airport.
BONUS: Touring Haneda Airport’s New International Terminal
AirlineReporter was invited to join in the inbound flight’s arrival festivities at YVR, and to fly to Haneda on the inaugural. As AR.com’s Vancouver-based correspondent, I was given this ’œplum’ assignment. But not without much jealousy coming from our staff in the Seattle area, including our illustrious Editor-in-Chief!
Blue1 is based in Copenhagen and is owned by the SAS Group. Their fleet of nine Boeing 717s fly to destinations around Europe, but mostly within Finland.
BONUS: Video of Blue1 Boeing 717
They offer wet leases for other airlines, tour operators, and a variety of other long/short-term deals.
Blue1 also offers a pretty slick looking livery. It starts with a blue tail and swirls and gradients itself into lighter blue and purple hues before becoming white in the front. It goes against the boring European white liveries that have become more popular, and is quite a bit more exciting than its parent’s much more boring livery.
Connect with Blue1: Web | Twitter (@SAS) | Facebook (SAS)
In the Western world, when it comes to aircraft production, it is pretty much common that the aircraft designer is also the manufacturer of said aircraft. For example, in the United States, Boeing, Lockheed, and McDonnell Douglas were the three big manufacturers of civil aircraft through the 1990’s. All three of these companies employed many thousands of engineers designing every part of each aircraft family, and then would hand the design over to many thousand more factory workers who would build the aircraft at vast company-owned factories. In the former Soviet Union (USSR), things worked a little differently.
When one thinks of Soviet-era aircraft, one normally thinks of the very popular civil designs by Ilyushin and Tupolev. But what most do not realize is that these famous companies were not in the business of aircraft manufacturing. Within the Soviet Union, the aviation industry was governed by three main government organizations: the Ministry of Aviation Industry (МиниÑтерÑтво авиационной промышленноÑти, or MAP), the Ministry of Civil Aviation (МиниÑтерÑтво гражданÑкой авиации, or MGA), and the Ministry of Defense (МиниÑтерÑтво обороны, or MO).
How well do you know airline liveries?
Wow, it has been years since I have done one of these livery challenges and that is just too long. Some of you old time readers probably remember (and either love or hate them), but I want to introduce them to some of the new readers.
The idea is quite simple. I give you some images of different airlines parts/pieces and you need to tell me, in the comments, #1 what airline does the image belong to and #2 what is the airplane type.
If you have your answers (you do not need to know them all) go ahead and post them in the comments to show your livery knowledge. Now, no cheating and looking in the comments for ideas. There are no prizes, just you know that you are an airline livery bad ass.
In a few days, I will post the answers and links to the full pictures. Good luck!
An Antonov AN-124 parked next to the Future of Flight with a Boeing 747 Dreamlifter in the background – Photo: Future of Flight
It is hard to deny that Paine Field is freak’n awesome. Not only is this where Boeing builds all their new 747s, 767s, 777s and most of their 787s; it also houses old warbirds and often sees the Boeing 747-400 Dreamlifter and sometimes an Antonov AN-124.
BONUS: Photo tour of the inside of an Antonov AN-124
It is always fun when catching some of these aircraft together. Today, an AN-124 was caught parked next to the Future of Flight (backed in) with a Dreamlifter in the background saying, “why hello.” Both are very cool cargo planes and getting them in the same picture is pretty epic.
Thanks to the Future of Flight for sharing their photo.
