For those of you lucky readers who live in the Seattle area, you are invited to an aviation geek’s dream evening. This Sunday (December 6th), the Future of Flight, Alaska Airlines, Horizon Airlines, and Custom Models are hosting an Aviation Geekfest. The event will occur at the Future of Flight (directions) from 3pm to 6pm. The fest includes:
* VIP tour of the Boeing 787 line
* Access to the Future of Flight
* Free pizza and beer (and soda)
* Meet the Tweeters behind Alaska Airlines, Horizon Airlines and Future of Flight.
* Meet me, Founder of AirlineReporter.com [I’ll even let you take free pictures with me :)]
* Meet special guests
* Ability to win some freaking awesome prizes (yea I mean AWESOME – don’t believe me? You could win tickets to the Future of Flight Foundation’s VIP party to view the first flight of the 787 – yea told you AWESOME)
Tickets are limited to the first 48 people that register, which you can do starting at NOON TODAY (PST). Hurry because once the tickets are gone, they are gone! Hope to see you there, and if I don’t, you can read about it here!
Update @ 12:04pm –
Wow, in less than a minute all the tickets were accounted for. That is awesome! Follow me on Twitter and watch out for a blog post to cover the event!
Big photo shows a photo taken by Mark Hsiung showing the fuel dump of the Boeing 777 and the inset shows a passenger photo of the dump.
NYCAviation wrote up a blog talking about a Saudi Arabian Airlines Boeing 777-200ER having to make an emergency landing at JFK, after having gear issues after landing. In their comments, a passenger posted pictures of the fuel dump from the inside, giving a unique perspective.
After take off, the left rear landing gear door was still open (as seen in the photo). The pilot declared an emergency and for safety and weight issues, the aircraft dumped its fuel, reportedly circling twice, before landing.
The aircraft landed safely and no one on board was injured.
FlightBlogger Jon Ostrower has been told by multiple program sources that Boeing is looking at December 14th to be the possible first flight for their highly anticipated Boeing 787.
Boeing completed their static test yesterday, and will be numbers crunching until about December 9th. Yes, the aircraft has been long-delayed, but I think the long wait might be worth it.
What’s crazier than one passenger calling in a bomb threat to delay a flight? Having two different passengers calling in bomb threats to delay two separate flights a world away from each other.
The first one involves Claudia De La Rosa who didn’t want her boss to miss his American Airlines flight from Miami to Honduras last Wednesday. Instead of having to pay a ticket change fee or deal with a grumpy boss, she decided to email a bomb threat to delay the flight. It worked and the flight was delayed while police searched the aircraft. De La Rosa made it easy for police to track her down, since she sent the incriminating email using her work computer and was quickly arrested. That is going the extra mile for the boss, but I expect she won’t have her job for much longer. No word if her boss even made that flight.
All the way around the world in Delhi, a man called in a bomb threat last Sunday to delay his relative’s flight. Mubarak Ali’s relative got to the airport at 9pm, but his 8:55pm IndiGo flight was already pushed back from the gate. Not willing to accept his relative arriving late, Ali called the airline’s flight center and reported the plane had a bomb. The IndiGo flight, with 164 passengers, was sent to an isolated area of the airport and was searched. Of course no bomb was found and Ali was tracked down and arrested for making a fake bomb threat. As before, no idea if Ali’s relative was able to make it in time to pay for bail.
I have seen people do some crazy things (mostly just running very fast and asking people to cut in line, so not that crazy), but calling (or emailing) in a bomb threat just doesn’t make any sense. I for one would never want De La Rosa or Ali planning my next trip.
This great, 4minute video takes you the history of Northwest Airlines. From their first flight to a nod to the merger at the end. The video shows a few employees saying, “the sun will never set on Northwest Airlines,” however at the very end there is an animated Northwest tail that flips around and shows the Delta livery, showing they realize that the sun will soon set on the Northwest Airlines livery.
