Flying Photo moved to www.plasticpilot.net

Dear reader,

given its succes, and to make things easier to manage, but also easier to read for you, this blog has been moved to www.plasticpilot.net

I'm sorry if this cause any inconvenience to you, but hope to see you there soon !

PlasticPilot

Islands - St Marguerite and St-Honorat

These two islands known as "Iles de Lérins" are in the bay of Cannes (LFMD). They are used as a VFR reporting point, and they are just east of the LLZ / DME approach. The small one is St-Honorat, and the large one is St-Marguerite.


This picture has been taken by a pasenger, while I was busy flying the LLZ DME approach for runway 35. Usually, we have circlings to runway 17 because of sea breeze, but as it was approximately 10 o'clock in the morning, the wind was calm, so I've been cleared for a direct approach.

The burning building - a sad picture

Usually, flying gives kind of a magical view of the world as it passes below our wings. However, on this particular day, what we could see was quite sad.

This black smoke exactly in runway axis was coming from a building in fire in the middle of the city, shown on the second picture.

Short landing in PA32

The photos of this landing are not the usual ones from long, mid and short final, because this was not exactly a standard landing. I was back to Geneva, my homebase, with three passengers in a PA32, flying VFR. The grass ruwnay, which can be shown left of the main runway, was not an option because it is too sort with its 520 meters.

After a couple of 360's end of downwind waiting for a "hole" in the commercial traffic, the controller asked me to fly an inner base and a short landing, to vacate first left.

What, not in the axis ?

Students and low time pilots, don't do that. Low level turns are bad !

Any other question ?

By this time, I was flying a lot with this plane, so I knew quite well how to manage such a landing, even if the first picture is not exactly promising.

A special note here to the amateur photographer for his good job. These pictures have been take from the back seat, and the autofocus did not get trapped by the windshield or the compas, which ruined so many Piper photos...

Mont-Ventoux

This shot of the Mont-Ventoux has been taken from FL 90, flying IFR to southern France. The ground may seem quite close for en-route IFR, and it is. In fact the controller asked me a few miles before to climb to FL110, which appears to be the minimum enroute altitude.

As ground was clearly in sight, I negociated with him to maintain FL090. and one passenger could take this amazing shot of Mont-Ventoux, which is frequently a stop in the Tour de France. Its top is above 2000 meters.

Radar contact

All IFR pilots like to hear "Radar contact", meaning that the controller has your blip on his radar and is caring about you.

This picture has been taken on a november day, from a Super Cub. Special thanks to the pilot, as I'm not (yet ?) Super Cub qualified. It is a shot of the "La Dôle" radar station, seen from the south. Geneva is just the other side of the ridge.

The main radome protects the Mode-S secondary radar, the small one to its right is a weather radar, and the last one to the right on a mast contains the antenna of a direction finder.

THE detail

Sometines a single detail makes a picture different and singular. This picture has been taken from a PA32, on VFR flight to Calvi (LFKC) in Corsica, on base for runway 36, from the back seat. It is the first picture on this blog coming from a non-digital camera.

The day was quite hazy, but one can see the coast line and the bay. But what makes it fun is the military C130 "Transal" left of the runway, or more in detail the black line behind this plane.

Calvi is where the french army trains the marine parachuters, and you guessed it, the line being the C130 is made of soldiers waiting for boarding, for their first low-altitude (500 ft) jump... in the sea ! They were slightly delayed because of our landing...

Monte-Bianco

This picture of Mont-Blanc (litterally Mount-White), or Monte-Bianco in Italian, has been taken on an IFR departure from Geneva, approximately passing 7'000ft climbing to FL090.

It is one of the privileges of flying IFR in this region to have such views, as all VFR have to remain much lower, below airpsace C of the TMA.

It was a high pressure summer day, in early enough in the morning to have no thermal activity at all, explaining the low haze layers. The colors have not been modified, they probably look blue-ish as a combination of taking the shot trough the plane window, and because of the zoom factor and side-light.

Looking at this picture fills me with smoothness and relaxation, as was the flight on this day.

Reflections on passengers

I've been flying light aircrafts for 6 years by the time I start this blog, and one of the things I prefer in this activity is the possibility to share the pleasures of flying with my passengers. Some of them flew in a light aicraft for the first time, and some also flew for the first time on this occasion !

Some are fellow pilots, other as family members or friends. Their level of aeronautical knowledge varies a lot, but I hope they all shared a part of my passion. Most of them are taking pictures, and movies, and the purpose of this blog is to share this photographic work, and also to provide other pilots with tips on aero photography.

Note that this blog has a twin, dedicated to flying video.

One funny thing with passengers is that they almost always take the same shots. There are some routes I fly more frequently, and I can now say in advance what kind of pictures I will get after the flight.

One example is given by the two pictures of this first post. I promise they have been made on different days, by different passengers. It is not the same plane, as one is a PA28 and the other a PA32, but apart from that these pictures are so simillar...

Another thing I like about the one with the shiny propeller spinner (the cone in the center of the prop) is that depite its mirror aspect, and because of its shape, the photographer's reflection can not be seen !