Nguyen Vu Loc

Muhammad: You should read all topics relating to LIMA in our MW website, there are 2 last days for general public. About the trade days, I had registered online and will pay only 50 ringgits when I collect the visitor tag at the Convention (50Rm not 500USD!) With this pass I can enter every trade days. The difficulty is being accepted as trade visitor and cannot wear shorts & T-shirt. I work for the oil&gas industry and my only relationship with aviation is hiring helicopter for offshore crew change,yet I get positive reply right after completion of the registration form. So try to register right now, today 17 is the last day for online registration.

Hon Kit: Yes so far, if QR keeps flying DOH-SGN-PNH-SGN-DOH instead of DOH-SGN-DOH. I think 77W is not economical for a very short sector SGN-PNH and correct me if wrong, PNH cannot handle 77W as I don't see any scheduled flight to PNH with 77W. B774F Cathay Cargo touch-down on RWY25L

The runway 25R/07L of Tan Son Nhat (SGN) was closed for 8 months from 25 Feb'13 for major repair and upgrade. This will slow down the traffic, gives headache to ATC guys but make us spotters happy 1/ A332 Qatar landing while A321 Cambodia Angkor Air is waiting to line up RWY07R 2/ The same A332 Qatar landed on RWY25L 5 hours later after a short hop to PNH for Doha - Phnom Penh - Doha passengers. Note the white X and construction work on the runway 25R

Hi Flee, Cung chuc Tan Xuan (similar to Cantonese Cung Hi Fat Choi). I'll be at LGK afternoon 27 but had to leave afternoon 29! the 1st public day, due to unawareness when booking AK flights. Since the Airport hotel is fully booked, I'll stay at Kuala Melaka Inn.not too far away. Longing to see you and other MW friends at this event.

Sunset collection of airliners on final approach RWY25R 1/ B738MH 2/ A321 VNA 3/ A332 VNA

Flee & Liew Hon Kit: Thanks for your support and I do like your return soon to SGN. The tradewind is changing and we got more shots of aircraft landing and take-off from RWY07. We have a new location (cafe again!) abeam of 07R threshold, you will certainly like it B767 Transaero charter flight B77W Qatar late afternoon departure

1/ B738 MH 9M-MLE climbing from RWY25R 2/ 2 CX B744 arriving at the same time: 1 Cargo, 1 pax 3/ A rare visitor: A319CJ Republica Italia

I dedicate the first 3 pics in this topic to KS Ong who gives us an insight view of the making of the MH retro-jet 9M-MXA 1/ 9M-MXA on final at RWY25R VVTS 2/ Taxi out to RWY25L for departure to KUL as flight MH759 3/ Rolling for take-off 4/ Sat,19 Jan is my lucky day with 4 special-livery aircraft including this A320 AK 9M-AFO the "wingman" of MH's 9M-MXA

Pieter: We have photos but not viewers

Super KS for this rare photo of the B734 PIC (BL) VN-A189 outside of Vietnam. Dunno it's at SZB for maintenance then back to SGN for Tet (CNY) flights or it's been returned to the lessor. Jetstar Pacific has announced that its fleet is fully converted to A320s.

Timothy: This is a Zeppelin cockpit. Quote from the source picture "The cockpit of the Farmers Airship, also known as the Eureka, as it flies over Fort Worth, Texas. Captain Kate Board is the only female Zeppelin pilot in the world." At first I thought this is the cockpit of the Zeppelin NT of Airship Ventures.

Farismanap: Your pics are really good. I bet that it took you some time to get rid of the greenish hue since you shot through the glass panels of VVTS Terminal 2. The next time, I suggest you to climb up to level 4's coffee lounge where you can take easier photos of the heavies parking at gates.

Yeah, the recent mishap (21 July, 2012) is a USAF C17A landed (& took-off) from the 3,405ft runway 04/22 of Peter O. Knight airport (KTPF) Tampa Florida instead of MacDill AFB, its destination about 4 miles away See video: http://www.wtsp.com/news/article/264803/8/Massive-military-plane-lands-at-wrong-airport-in-Tampa The most famous wrong airport landing in Vietnam during wartime (1969) is a charter DC-8 of Seaboard World Airways which landed by mistake at Marble Mountain Army Airfield (OV-1 Mohawk base with a 5,000ft narrow runway) at 2am in the morning. They had been cleared to land at Danang Main Airport (DAD, VVDN) 3 miles away but landed at Marble instead.

Flee: Very nice Hercules' prop vortex and the lighting is dramatic too

On Sunday 2 September, a Swiss International Airlines plane carrying 200 passengers from Zurich to Beijing was forced to turn back yesterday after two fliers became embroiled in a violent confrontation. The two men were 27 and 57 years old, and were both Chinese citizens, according to a report in the Swiss German-language newspaper Blick. Mehdi Guenin, a spokesman for the airline, confirmed that an altercation had taken place more than six hours into the flight. “The two passengers were handed over to the police of the canton of Zurich after the Airbus A340 landed on Sunday evening,” the spokesman told the French news agency AFP. They were set to be questioned by police on Monday. The plane was just east of Moscow when the pilot decided to turn it around, according to the spokesman. Although it was due to make a stopover in the Russian capital, the pilot opted to head back to Zurich to avoid administrative difficulties. Swiss International Airlines paid for the plane’s 200 passengers to stay at a hotel in the Swiss city before placing them on flights to Beijing with other companies, as its own service to the Chinese capital on Monday was fully booked. A spokesman for Zurich police said alcohol had played role in the fight. Source: http://www.telegraph...ight-brawl.html I've seen this news report on French TV5. The airline's spokeperson explained the reason to turn back to Zurich instead of landing at Moscow, the scheduled stopover: If the flight had to be suspended for police investigation, about 130 pax. would need Russian visa to allow transitioning to hotels till their next flight, this will require a lot of paperwork and make passengers upset if being kept too long in the airport transit area.

@Pieter: the AN32 carried the cargo back to Singapore's Seletar airport. By the shape of crate (1 or max 2 per flight) I guess it's carrying aircraft landing gear since VNA has contracted with ST for landing gear maintenance work. Lufthansa's B744 landing on RWY25R during windy afternoon

Thank you, TK and Jonathan for this rare picture. I do miss these sleek TU-134B which were the main aircraft for SGN-HAN and regional flights during the 80's till 1997. The TU-134s and the IL-18 (far left) in your pic were already "mothballed" by the way maintenance personnel had put supporting jacks under the tail sections.

Flee: I booked yesterday the AK tickets to Langkawi, arriving there 27 March. Are there demo flights on all days of the Exhibition? Thks

Very nice Jonathan. The location is now re-accessible?

B-744 Flight LH772 D-ABVZ landing on RWY25R with Uncle Pieter onboard 2. Last Sunday 17/6, this A320 AK882 requested ground support on landing due to technical problem at landing gear. Luckily eveything were OK, the aircraft touched down smoothly and evacuated the runway before engine shutdown. The aircraft was towed to parking 23 with all persons on board. Company's mechanics together with engineers from Vietnamese A75 aviation maintenance company made an express check/repair. The aircraft was able to depart back to KUL after 1h15' delay.

Pieter, if you don't fill in the special request part when booking with Agoda about free return airport transfer, you still can inform the hotel reception: The Phoenix Bangkok address 88 Ladkrabang Soi 7, Ladkrabang Road, Ladkrabang, Bangkok 10520 Tel. +66 2 737 1446 Fax: +66 2 737 1477 E-mail : reservation@phoenixhotelbangkok.com Most of these hotels are short of English-speaking staff so they may not reply to your e-mail but you can use their shuttle van when you arrive. My experience last February is: - Go to gate 4 of the Arrival Terminal where all pick-ups are done there. - If you don't see any people with the hotel's name board, just ask the pick-up agents there, they know all the shuttle services. - Most of the time you have to exit the terminal at gate 4 and go straight about 30m to the sidewalk where vans stop and look for the van with your hotel name, Shuttle services arrive every hour, so expect to find your van around 10 min. past the hour. - When you find the right van, show your booking form to the driver and that's it.

B763 Winglet Austria OE-LAW departed from SGN carrying aboard the Austria's president and delegation. 1/ 2/ 3/ 4/

MAS Kargo begins cargo flights to SGN yesterday 12 May, 2012. I don't know whether there are ATC 's instructions to delay arrival or not, but the A330F 9M-MUC landed at SGN right after a torrential downpour (with 2 VNA's heavies go-around). 1/ Water Cannon salute right at the control tower. Unfortunately I can't shoot the full view of the aircraft at this ceromony due to a VNA's 332 parking at gate. 2/ 3/ There was also red-carpet welcome at the SGN Cargo Terminal but it's out of view. The Cargo jet departed back to KUL about 03 hours after landing 4/ Best wishes to MAS Kargo and according to Fong Shui, success will come like rain on the opening day of this cargo business.

RIP Sukhoi Superjet. Our spotting plan of its arrival to VVNB (HAN) on 14 May is now cancelled

Some photos of special scheme aircraft that I took during the last 07 days 1/ A340 Turkish "Star Alliance" 2/ A321 Asiana "Star Alliance" 3/ A320 Thai Air Asia "year of the dragon"