Odds and ends

Here's something I saw that I thought was kind of interesting in a geeky sort of way. This is a flight plan strip; one of these will print out at the Clearance Delivery position for each aircraft planning to depart LAX. The interesting thing about this particular one is the callsign: AAL1050, and its assigned transponder code: 1050. There's no correlation between an aircraft's registration or callsign and the squawk code assigned to it, so this is a rare coincidence. I probably see this myself once a year or so, and it always causes me to look again at the strip to make sure that I didn't transpose or imagine the numbers. A similar sort of thing will happen occasionally in which a flight crew will input their flight number into the transponder instead of the assigned squawk code. This usually causes minor havoc until we can get it sorted out as it usually means that their transponder target appears as some other flight on the radar until they can input the assigned code.


In other news, Delta has become the third airline (after Hong Kong and Asiana) to bring the Airbus A350 to LAX, operating it between Los Angeles and Shanghai:

Meanwhile, Alaska is planning to phase out some of the Bombardier Dash 8s flown by their regional partner Horizon. In their place will be Embraer 175s. We have already started to see Embraer 175s in Alaska colors at LAX flown by SkyWest, although so far primarily covering routes not currently served by the Dash 8. This particular Dash 8 bears the colors of the University of Alaska Anchorage Seawolves:

A Horizon Dash 8 and a SkyWest E175 - the airplane that will be its replacement

The Dash 8 and the E175 have similar seating capacities (76 passengers), although the Dash 8 has single-class seating while the E175 offers three classes of seating. The Dash 8 is more fuel efficient, but the E175 is faster.

Time for another construction update photo:

I deliberately took this photo under the cloudy sky because the construction near the American hangar has reached a stage where there is a great deal of exposed shiny sheet metal that glares terribly in the sunlight.

On a personal note, some of you may be aware that I am also a pilot. The CaptainVector airfarce currently consists of a tired Cessna 172. I mention this because I will soon have to bring this airplane into compliance with the FAA requirement for ADS-B. I am currently considering either a Stratus ESG or a Lynx NGT-9000:

 

 

Anybody who has experience with either of these units is invited to comment with your thoughts and experiences. These comments will not be published unless you authorize; I merely seek input before spending a large percentage of the aircraft's worth on new tech.

And finally, apropos of nothing relating to aviation, this happened:

Really not just another RJ

As many of you have noted, one of the aircraft in last time's shot is not a regional jet. Let's see that shot again:

There is a hint in the photo: one of the airplanes is marked "Delta Connection" and the other is not. Many of you caught that the airplane on the runway, which is the one facing to the left in the picture above, is in fact a mainline Delta B717. The Delta Connection airplane really is an RJ, in this case a CRJ9 operated by SkyWest.

To some of you, the B717 may look very familiar -- though you don't remember it as a Boeing product. It takes very little imagination for this to look like the DC9's almost-identical twin. Which, in a manner of speaking, is pretty much what it is. The B717 is essentially a shortened version of the McDonnell Douglas MD-90 (which Delta also flies, although not into LAX right now). This model was to be called the MD-95, but Boeing took over before it went into production. The MD-90 was a revised and improved model developed from the MD-80, and the MD-80 was itself an improved version of the DC-9. So in a real sense, this B717 is the final iteration of the DC-9.

This is not the first aircraft to be labelled a B717; prior to this a shortened version of the B707 wore the name for a short while before becoming what is now known as the B720. Before that, there was another model 717: the aircraft now known as the C-135 or KC-135. Boeing's internal model designation for the C/KC-135 series was the model 717.

This is not the first time we've seen B717s at LAX. It's been years, but we used to have Midwest B717s. Here's one from May of 2008, along with a Delta MD-88:

Before Midwest, AirTran operated B717s at LAX for a short while. The B717 is not a long-range airplane; LAX to Atlanta was too far, so they went into DFW. This was before AirTran added the B737 to their fleet; once those aircraft came online, LAX to Atlanta nonstops became a reality, and the AirTran B717s left LAX.

Except now they're back, flying for Delta. If you look closely, you can see that the Delta B717s all have tail numbers ending in "AT"; these were AirTran airplanes until Southwest took over AirTran. Southwest opted not to add a second aircraft type to its fleet, and so the B717s were sold off. They didn't have to go very far, though: AirTran and Delta both used Atlanta as a home base.

Since early this month at LAX, Delta is using the B717s on regional routes, mostly up and down the coast -- on routes that have often been served (and in most cases, still are) by SkyWest CRJs and/or Compass E175s.  The B717 is bigger than the largest of these, the CRJ9 -- but just barely. I won't go into comparing all the specifications, although I will give you links for them below. The most important (from an airline perspective) number is passenger seating: Delta's B717s are configured for 110 passengers; the CRJ9s that SkyWest flies for Delta are set up for 76 passengers. Going the other direction, the next largest airplane in the mainline Delta fleet are the Boeing B737-700 and the Airbus A319. These seat 124 and 126 passengers, respectively, but neither of these are seen at LAX very much.

Since this has become pretty much an entry about Delta, I'll close with one more photo from the archives -- one that features three Delta aircraft that are no longer seen at LAX:

From the top: B767-400; MD-90; E145 flown by Express Jet as Delta Connection

Resources:

Delta B717

Delta CRJ9

Delta CRJ7

Delta E175

Delta A319

Delta B737

Delta fleet

Wikipedia B717

Boeing B717

Happy New Year!

Welcome to 2015! I'll start the new year off with a collection of noteworthy heavy jet shots taken over the holidays. These first don't seem so notable at first, until you consider that we hardly ever get Delta or United B747s at LAX anymore. These two both showed up and then left again on the same day.

KLM still brings in a daily B747. This one is marked to commemorate their 95th anniversary:

Next, the latest carrier to replace their B747s at LAX with B777s:

China Airlines (callsign: Dynasty) has recently started operating B777s between LAX and Taipei

Air Canada's Rouge normally operates A319s at LAX, but during the holiday season they've also shown up in a B767:

Besides the Rouge B767, also notable in this shot is the TACA Airbus; we don't see this livery at LAX much anymore; most of the TACA aircraft we see now bear the new Avianca paint scheme

Gratuitous dragon photo: