A VERY rare Heavy Metal Visitor....

Ft Lauderdale was graced with a very special visitor today, Friday 4/15 - Capt. Bruce Dickinson, Iron Maiden and Ed Force One graced the Ft Lauderdale skies as a stop on the Final Frontier tour. Of course, when there is a special visitor like this, there was perfect sunlight 5 minutes before landing and perfect sunlight 5 minutes after landing, but during the approach and landing - there were a couple of errant clouds that obstructed direct sunlight, but, still, there was enough good light to be able to catch this rare visitor. On this trip, there are only 2 US dates - Ft Lauderdale on 4/16 and Ft Myers on 4/17 before they head back to Europe, so to catch this is for me is a once in a lifetime experience and I was glad to be able to get it! She leaves Ft Lauderdale sometime on Sunday morning - I'd like to try and get a departure shot, but, that depends on the weather and the time...but...who knows!

Some more time spent behind the camera lens.....

A welcome return....

It's been a while since I've seen a Viking in Ft Lauderdale - and - in this case, it's the call sign of Thomas Cook Scandinavia. A year or so ago, they used to be a standard charter every two weeks, but this winter season, have been conspicuous in their absence. However, last Monday, I saw the VKG (Viking) call sign on Flightaware coming in from Stockholm and after a short visit, heading out to Aruba. Not sure if this was a one off charter or if it's going to turn into a regular charter again, but it sure was a good sight on a perfect day.

A little more time spent behind the camera lens....

Florida rainy season is starting.....

We are getting to that point in South Florida where storms and rain blow up pretty quickly and can put (excuse the pun) a damper on some spotting - particularly if spotting time is limited like a lunch hour. So, to get a few good spots in the little time is great - even between the weather.

This G-II59A I've seen around a few times. Her home base is Boca Raton (KBCT). A bit of a smoky departure into the lunchtime sky - still a majestic lady though.

This Learjet is based out of Indiana. She's a relatively new aircraft built in 2008, and still looks pretty new.

This Dash8-Q400 has been on my wish list for quite a while. This is my first Q400 - and I can well believe the Q stands for Quiet! She really is a very quiet aircraft. Registered to the US Dept of Justice, a lovely color scheme and also a fairly young aircraft, having been manufactured in 2009.

And finally, I managed to get another off the wish list - the last of the special schemes for jetBlue - the New York Jets logo jet! I've seen her a lot of times in bad light, night light, when I haven't had my camera, but, finally, all the starts aligned and I finally caught her in good light. Now there are only two special schemes that I don't have - the airTran Orlando Magic B717 and the Delta domestic SkyTeam B757 - but - I'll be on the watch for them.

Some good light thank goodness, but who knows over the next few weeks....rain is welcome in the drought of South Florida, but - can it just stay away at lunchtime!

In the meantime, some more time spent behind the camera lens....

Shooting the Super Moon...

Not the aviation pictures I normally post, but I was playing with some settings shooting the Super Moon on Saturday 3/20 - just thought I'd post a few....

A quick Saturday afternoon visit to Ft Lauderdale.....

My son and I decided to take a short visit to Ft Lauderdale Saturday afternoon. There was one interesting possible sighting that was in the offing (see below), but the rest seemed to be the usual suspects. When we got to Ft Lauderdale, a fellow spotter told me that the airTran Orlando Magic special scheme was in - great I thought - it's going to be a productive afternoon. We were there 2 1/2 hours - the airTran never moved....annoying - I've never seem them do a 3+ hour turnaround - even on a Saturday!!!

But - there were a couple of interesting sights - the first this Westwind from Columbia. Westwinds are pretty rare at the best of times, but to have this clean looking version from Columbia made it a good catch. If I remember a fellow spotters translation, the company name on the plane is something to do with sugar.

The other good catch of the afternoon was this Condor B767-300ER. What was interesting about this visitor is this was originally a direct flight from Frankfurt to Cancun. However, after 10h 17m flight, they decided to stop at Ft Lauderdale for fuel for 20 mins before carrying on to Cancun. The only thing I can surmise is that when they loaded fuel and departed Frankfurt, they hadn't guessed the total affect of the winds across the Atlantic and so getting close to the US coast, they decided to stop for fuel. The decision must have been made a while into the flight as I saw this on Flightaware about 2 hours before the actual landing. But, it was literally a 20 minute fuel stop and then they were on their way to Cancun. But, it was nice to be able to catch Snoopy and Woodstock visiting Ft Lauderdale.

The sun is starting to get a little higher in the sky now which is causing a lot of the spotters to call it a season until probably September. Not me - I'll be there all summer - you never know what you are going to get - as witnessed by these two.....

In the meantime, more time spent behind the camera lens...

Biz-jets again...for the Miami Boat Show

Recently, the Miami Boat Show was held and that brought more than normal General Aviation traffic into Ft Lauderdale for a few days. I managed to get up there for an hour on one of those days and was rewarded with some very nice sights.

This is the first time I've seen one of the Hawker 4000's - looks very much like an extended 125-700 or 125-800 series - but a very nice looking biz-jet!

Three in a row for Gulfstream G550's each with their own unique color scheme - but still looking stunning!

Then a couple of Canadair Challengers - unfortunately, no Global Expresses, my favorite biz-jet.

Some more time spent behind the camera lens....

Another Miami visit...another Transaero missed....

My son and I went down to Miami to again attempt to catch the Transaero B777 from Moscow - and - again, we missed it. After seeing the Lufthansa B747-400 arrive on runway 12, fellow spotter Matt Smith and I headed from the south side and runway 9 to the holes spotting location and runway 12 thinking this was the first of the European arrivals setting the precident. Of course, what came in on runway 9??? The Transaero - EI-UNW with the Cyrillic titles as well. When it left at 4:40pm, it was in cloud - this plane eluded me again - but - there has to be one day where I can get it in good light - and - hopefully, that will be soon.

But, while the clouds came and went, there were some decent catches to be had as well - mainly we stayed on runway 12, but went around to the south side and runway 9 for one visitor. This first catch, the World Atlantic is a newish airline operating out of Miami to the Caribbean and it made the catch even better by going off on runway 12 right in front of us.

More and more Continental aircraft are getting the United titles with the merger going ahead - this Boeing 757-200 came in on runway 12 right in front of us.

Another catch that has eluded me for a long time is any of the British Airways or American Airlines aircraft in the oneWorld titles, and again this was true - the regular colored British Airways Boeing 747-400 landing on runway 12.

I've been trying to catch one of these Caribbean Airlines Boeing 737-800's with the small air Jamaica titles for quite a long time - after catching the air Jamaica Boeing 737-800 in January. Fortunately, this one did the same as the World Atlantic MD-80 - it left on runway 12.

The one time that we did go back to the south side of the airport to runway 9 was to get this Aerolinas Aergentinas A340-300 - normally I miss this - so it was good to get it.

Another that came in on runway 12 - and something I've been wanting for a while as well is the new Air France colors - this Boeing 747-400 obliged us.

Finally, and the treat of the day was this Royal Netherlands Air Force KDC-10 that came in, sat for a couple of hours getting gas and then departing again to Haiti - it was the highlight of the afternoon - being such a rare catch.

Hopefully, another trip to Miami will allow me to get the Transaero Boeing 777 soon, but, in the meantime, some more time spent behind the camera lens....