flee

Yes, Concorde with the four afterburning RR-Snecma Olympus engines must be one of the loudest on take offs (AND landings). Also on this list is the Ilyushin Il-62 - another noisy smoky airliner.

MH is a flag carrier - so optimizing yield is quite low on its list of priorities. Its more important for it to fly the flag for Malaysia and be a flying taxi service for the VVIPs.

Yes, it is something that all crew train for. However, MH has had two lucky escapes with the B734 in the past few months (the other being the undercarriage collapse in KCH). These are wake up calls and MH should probably be more vigilant with these old birds during maintenance checks. We don't want to be "third time lucky" do we?

IPOH, March 24 (Bernama) -- FlyFirefly Sdn Bhd (Firefly) is proposing to increase its flight frequency to twice daily for the Ipoh-Singapore from one daily flight currently. Managing Director of Firefly, Datuk Eddie Leong said the proposal was based on the high demand for the route which records a 90 per cent take-up each flight. "Prior to this, Firefly had followed the World Travel Mart in London and had been at the ITB in Berlin recently and we saw a lot of interest for the Ipoh-Singapore route and now they are aware of this direct link between Singapore and Ipoh. Many European companies offer flights to Singapore such as KLM, Air France and British Airways," he told reporters here on Wednesday. He said Firefly was also scheduled to receive three more ATR72-500 aircraft costing US$18 million each at the end of this year and this will further support the company's plan to expand its network and increase passenger number. Earlier, Leong represented Firefly in signing a strategic partnership agreement with the state government of Perak. The state was represented by State Secretary Datuk Dr Abdul Rahman Hashim. Menteri Besar Datuk Seri Dr Zambry Abdul Kadir witnessed the signing held at the Menteri Besar office here today. The partnership is aimed at giving focus to enabling international flights between the Sultan Azlan Shah Airport (LTSAS) in Ipoh with Singapore's Changi International Airport. It is also aimed at promoting Perak as a major tourist destination and encouraging new investments and business expansion to drive Perak's economic growth. The state government will allocate RM2.4 million for the partnership with Firefly to market and promote the state's tourism sector in the first year and another RM1.8 million in the second year. Among others, the allocation will cover advertising and promotional campaigns. Source: http://www.bernama.com/bernama/v5/newsbusiness.php?id=485036

Yes, the Comet 4 and DC-8's take offs are both noisy and smoky! The same goes for the B737-100/200.

Congratulations Captn TK! Next stop, A380?

I wonder what failed - good thing it did not catch fire. Maybe it just ran out of fuel!

A Russian airliner carrying eight crew members and no passengers crashed in a forest while trying to land at a Moscow airport. There were no fatalities but four of the crew were seriously injured. The Russian TU-204 Aviastar-TU jet, which originated from Hurghada in Egypt, was approaching one of the landing strips of Domodedovo International Airport when it crashed. Video Here: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/8580179.stm

Well if you are under 30 years old, you might not be aware that BOAC and BEA (British European Airways) merged to form British Airways! More info on British Airways: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Airways

I remember the Caravelle because that was my first Airfix 1/144 scale model I put together. Also did a BEA Trident. I guess I was fascinated with rear engined planes in the late 60's... Looking at it now, it would seem that the 787's nose profile is rather similar to the Comet's.

Airport looks like Sungei Besi. The two Japan Airlines DC-8 are parked in very typical Subang Airport parking positions. Not so sure about the BOAC Comet 4 - suspiciously like Sg Besi too - the high mountains in the backgroud are not a feature of Subang. Interesting to see the tail of the Thai Caravelle too! Some info on 9V-BCV: http://www.aerotransport.org/php/go.php?query=airframes&qstring=F.27+msn+10467&q=9V-BCV&where=t2.type_id%3D2270002+and+pl.cn%3D10467.00&orderby=1

By next year another 16 A320s would have arrived. Not sure how many of them will be sent to FD, QZ and Vietjet AirAsia, though.

Not so sure about that - even SQ has not dared to do that. If anyone can get away with not having economy class, SQ can! Furthermore, if MH "abolishes" economy class, it is telling us that if we want lower priced tickets, we should go to D7! I doubt that is what is going to happen.

BTW, SQ's latest A333 delivery, 9V-STK should be in Changi anyday now...

Viewed side on the whalejet resembles the B747 SP!

Maybe D7 is practicing its fuel saving takeoffs and not using full thrust but using full runway!

Looks like Vietnam Airlines is making Tony Fernandes feel at home - they are behaving exactly the same way as MH is behaving!

I think that it is better not to unveil the website until it is properly designed and tested. Project management seems to be very weak at Silverfly. Ethics and professionalism is non-existent too. Well, if they want to survive, the only way they can go up. Otherwise they will sink like a ton of bricks.

Oh dear! A very bad start for Silverfly!

You are just being modest, uncle Vu Loc - you are a very accomplished photographer yourself! We have a great deal of quality pix here. Right now the weather is also challenging in KUL, thunderstorms almost every afternoon. I guess that is part and parcel of the "job"! Keep up the coverage from Vietnam - you have some unique and highly interesting traffic too.

Actually it is a bit different with AirAsia. There is basic customer service via the "Manage My Booking" facility on the website. There is also live chat. But a lot of people still want to make phone calls. It is a bit like banks have ATMs but people still like to deposit and withdraw money at the manual tellers. I still maintain that for changes caused by AirAsia, there should be free service in case the customer is not able to accept their changes. All other service that you require and the events are caused by yourself, you should be able to choose between standard or premium service.

Already happening in computers! Dell, HP, Acer, etc. all charge extra if you want 2 or 3 year warranties! Many companies are "unbundling" things so that the basic cost is the lowest cost.

Actually a 1-800 line should be given to all those who had their flights cancelled or retimed so that they can make alternative arrangements to the retimed or cancelled. If it is the customer who changes his mind after booking, they can elect for standard or premium service. Of course, they should continue with their web and live chat service.

Maybe you can hold a folded newspaper on top of your camera/tripod rig so that it acts like a lens hood. This may stop the bright lights from the top from striking the glass.

Airbus is stepping up its monthly A320 production rate to 36 aircraft, from 34, in order to prepare for market recovery. The increase will come into effect from December this year. Production of its long-haul A330/340 family will be kept at eight airframes per month. Airbus is aiming to keep its deliveries for 2010 around the same level as last year, when it delivered 498 aircraft including 402 A320-family jets. By the end of February, the manufacturer's 2010 deliveries totalled 67 aircraft including 56 from its single-aisle range. Its A320 backlog comprised 2,358 aircraft. Source: http://www.flightglobal.com/articles/2010/03/09/339218/airbus-to-raise-a320-production-rate.html