An Air Caraîbes Airbus A330 touching down at St. Martin – Photo: Bernie Leighton | AirlineReporter
Air Caraîbes is based at Pointe-à -Pitre International Airport (airport code: PTP) in Guadeloupe. It is a French airline, founded in July of 2000, that mostly flies from Paris to destinations in the Caribbean. In 2012, the airline flew 1.2 millions passengers, 750,000 of which were on long-haul routes.
It operates a fleet of five Airbus A330s (one -200 and four -300s) and three ATR 72s. They currently have six A350s on order (three for the -900 and three for the -1000).
The Boeing 727 first flew in February of 1963 and has been a work horse ever since. Even though it is hard to find these bad boys still flying, there is one airport in the US where they show up every once in a while, some in some interesting configurations: LAX.
This video, from SpeedbirdHD, shows off some of the different Boeing 727s that are still flying and visiting Los Angeles International Airport. The plane still has some life left in it!
This Boeing 777-200 (reg number: (9M-MRO) is the one in question with Malaysia Flight MH370 – Photo: Thomas Becker
Almost exactly one week after the Malaysian authorities confirmed that MH370 operating from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing had gone missing – today, in an astonishing turn of events, the government confirmed that Malaysian Airlines Flight 370 was hijacked. They have further confirmed that the aircraft was steered off course and flown for nearly seven hours. To where, they have not yet confirmed.
There is so much innuendo and speculation floating around, AirlineReporter’s senior staff thought we should throw our hats into the ring.
Korean Air’s A380 visits Prague for the first time – Photo: Jacob Pfleger | AirlineReporter
Yesterday, Korean Air premiered their Airbus A380 to Prague on their regular scheduled flight from Seoul. I was fortunate enough to receive an invitation to welcome the aircraft to Prague.
This was the third A380 operation to Prague since its introduction to service. The first was a Lufthansa bird, which came to Prague for crew/diversion support training, and then Emirates last year on a medical diversion.
A special viewing area set up for the event in the adjacent gate – Photo: Jacob Pfleger | AirlineReporter
Korean Air presently operate eight A380’s in their fleet and they deploy them primarily on their key routes to Los Angeles and Hong Kong; this one-off flight to Prague therefore came as a bit of a surprise. The reason behind this aircraft substitution (in lieu of the regular A330/B777 mix on the route) was due to a major EU technology conference in Hanover and the requirement for a large business class cabin.
Korean Air operates the least-densely-configured A380. The lower deck consists of 12 first class seats and 301 economy class seats with a generous 34-inch pitch. The upper deck is all business class, with a 94-seat cabin -this is by far the largest business class cabin on an airliner (mixed-class) to date.
The Breitling Jet Team flying in formation with two Swiss Air Force F/A-18 Hornets – Photo: Breitling SA
Around the world there are a number of government-run aerial demonstration teams. Australia has the Roulettes, Canada the Snowbirds, and Great Britian has the Red Arrows. The United States has two of these government-run teams, the US Air Force Thunderbirds & the US Navy Blue Angels. If you’re an American AvGeek, you’ve likely seen one of those domestic teams in your lifetime.
However there are some privately-run Aerial demonstration jet teams in the world, the largest of which is sponsored by luxury watch manufacturer Brietling. The Breitling Jet Team, composed of seven L-39C Albatros jet aircraft, have announced a major change to their 2015 schedule.
