G550 Airborne Early Warning Aircraft

Another very expensive aircraft. This is one of four (information as of today) G550 Airborne Early Warning aircraft. These are military variants of the G550 business jet, which start from 50 million dollars.

F-16D+

Apache AH-64D Attack Helicopter







Currently the only female AH-64D pilot in the RSAF.

Super Puma

Fokker F-50 Maritime Patrol Aircraft (MPA)

C-130H







Few has the patience to queue for over half an hour to get onboard the C-130H.



And a few lucky ones got to fly in one.

The only economy class seats on the upper deck are way at the back, rows 71-83. That’s just a tad over only 80 economy class seats on the upper deck of the SQ A380.

I can’t see the excitement in the experience of flying this new aircraft if I was crammed into a economy class seat in the lower deck. The experience would be no different from flying the goold old beauty, the Boeing 747.

But then again, I can’t possibly afford (or atleast not yet) those neat business class (J Class) seats taking up two thirds of the upper deck

The first commercial flight of the SQ A380 takes off with a lot of happy people on board (471 from what i gather) in about 10 minutes from now, not more than 5 kilometres from where I am right now. The cheapest ticket for this flight sold on eBay for US$560.00!

So, Singapore Airlines has been offering free in-flight internet access since the past week or so. This free service will continue until 4am (Singapore time) on 31 December 2006.

At present, Singapore Airlines offers this service only on flights between Singapore and

• London
• Los Angeles,
• Frankfurt
• New York
• San Francisco
• Sydney
• Tokyo

[Complete list of flight numbers on which this service is offered]

For most airlines, an aircraft needs to be about 60% full to break even. This figure is even higher for budget airlines (75-80% for Jetstar Asia). The official reason for Jetstar to stop flying to Kolkata is its the low number of passengers per flight (about 40%). But this might be part of the bigger problem(s) they face.

Anyways, all this is not a good news. There goes my chance to visit Kolkata anytime in the near future. Its just too expensive flying other airlines. A Singapore-Kolkata round trip costs about SGD 1000 on Singapore Airlines, SGD 900 on Indian Airlines and SGD 800 on Thai Airways.

Meanwhile, here is an interesting article I just came across on how budget airlines keep their costs low.

Everything is huge on this aircraft. To the left is a closeup view of 1 of the 4 Rolls-Royce Trent 900 engines that power this aircraft. I remember reading somewhere that just 2 of these are sufficient to fly this giant and I’m not surprised. They are so huge! To the right is a closeup view of 20 of the 22 wheels on an A380, the most number of wheels on any passenger aircraft. The A380′s tail (see below) is the largest aircraft tail amongst all commercial aircraft.
We weren’t allowed to get inside the A380 on the days it was open to public, however there were a lucky few who were allowed inside last week. You can find some of those photos here.

But thats ok, considering we got to see (what atleast to me was) the highlight of the day, the Singapore Airlines Airbus A380 approaching for a flypast earlier that day!
Executing the first of many sharp turns.. I have never seen any commercial aircraft turn like that before
And finally meet (and shake hands with) Mr. Peter Chandler, the test pilot who flew the A380, just an hour ago!
There are several sites/blogs where you can find more (better?) photographs of the A380 flypast. Here are a few (probably a professional) taken during the week (when it wasn’t open to public), http://www.radarvector.com/2006/02/a380-flying-display-at-aa06.html Also came across this blog dedicated to stamps dedicated to the Airbus A380! http://a380onstamps.iblogs.com/

Update [11-March-2006]
I have some videos of the A380 doing the flypast at the Asian Aerospace 2006. If you’d like to view them, just drop by a comment. [Your email is protected].

Finally.. I see it for real.. I regretted missing the chance to see it the last time it was in Singapore, back in mid-Novermeber last year.. I am so excited right now.

And oh by the way, I am guessing there’ll be another flypast at around noon (Singapore time) tomorrow (23rd February 2006). Get yourself (and your camera, ofcorse!) to the rooftop of The Singnature, in Changi Business Park.