Big Bird on its Way

[red750]

According to Geoffrey Thomas, aviation writer for the West Australian, the world's largest aircraft, the Antonov AV225 is due to make two trips to Perth in April. Dates still being finalised.

 

 

 

[onetrack]

With the new viewing area alongside Tonkin Hwy, this could be an impressive sight. Just viewing takeoffs and landings whilst driving along the new section of Tonkin Hwy, can produce some impressive sights now, as compared to the old hwy.

 

I've actually sighted a couple of rare TOGA events when a heavy came in pretty unstable, with the wind howling and gusting down off the Darling Scarp. I guess it'd take more than a gusty Easterly to upset an AV225 on short final!

 

I wonder what the large shipment is, that needs an Antonov delivery?

 

 

[red750]

According to the article, generators for the resource industry.

 

 

[onetrack]

I wonder why the massive urgency in the shipment? One would have thought sea shipping would have been the go. Must be because of an imminent failure or end-of-life for the component.

 

I was wandering through Hoffmans in Bassendean quite a few years, with John Hoffman guiding me. He showed us his blokes working on reconditioning a turbine rotor from the Muja power station in Collie.

 

This rotor was humungous! It must have been 18-20M long and about 4M in diameter. At that time (this was over 25 yrs ago), the rotor alone was worth $3M to replace. No doubt Hoffmans were cleaning up nicely on the recondition.

 

 

[UltraFlash]

With the new viewing area alongside Tonkin Hwy, this could be an impressive sight. Just viewing takeoffs and landings whilst driving along the new section of Tonkin Hwy, can produce some impressive sights now, as compared to the old hwy.

I was at the new viewing area when the first Emirates A380 landed in Perth, the whole area, the carpark and both sides of the access road were full of cars and people, there were even police on site directing traffic. I think the Airport would need to put aside additional viewing areas for this arrival, the entire area along the new Airport Drive would be perfect...

 

 

[nong]

An-225

 

An-225

 

An-225

 

 

[red750]

Yeah, I know. Mistype that I didn't pick up till it was too late to edit.

 

 

[Cosmick]

Hope the Runway is longer than Canberra, different Plane but ...........

 

 

 

[willedoo]

Before the coup in Kiev, there was a lot of talk of a license build agreement to build it's little brother, the An-124 in Russia.

 

Haven't heard anything on the subject since; the idea might have been dropped.

 

 

[UltraFlash]

I've read the designs are stored in Moscow, so that wouldn't be a factor.

 

There's also the second AN-225 which is stored near Kiev, half finished, and there was talk of finishing that aircraft, but I believe it's been sitting outside for nearly 10 years.

 

 

 

[red750]

The An-225 landed in Perth this afternoon, watched by an estimated 50,000 spectators.

 

 

[red750]

Who do you believe? It was Sky News who reported 50,000 as the plane landed. 7 News at 6.00 pm reports 16,000. The first report may include spectators on surrounding roads.

 

 

[onetrack]

There were 40,000 would-be spectators caught in the major traffic-jam that covered Tonkin Hwy and Gt Eastern Hwy - and probably 10,000 at the actual airport. The carparks at the airport wouldn't have held any more than 2 or 3 thousand cars.

 

It was bedlam on the roads, they were nothing more than slow-moving carparks all morning. People who were trying to catch flights couldn't get through.

 

I planned to avoid the airport, and thought I'd get a spot near the Guildford cemetery, which is close to being under the flight path and very close to the airport perimeter - but I couldn't get across the Swan River - Guildford Rd was chocked up with a traffic jam. It wasn't helped in the least by a big Festival being held in the centre of Guildford. I ended up getting a spot near the river in Bassendean and watched the big bird zoom in.

 

Quite surprised at the approach speed, she seemed to be coming in fast compared to the aircraft that landed a couple of minutes prior.

 

The bloke who drove up from Bunbury and who hired a chopper to photograph the approach and landing sure had it worked out!

 

 

[Kyle Communications]

Onetrack it weighed over 600 tonnes with that generator on board....the heavier you are the faster you got to be going on landing

 

 

[red750]

The An-225 has now left, but here is a link to an interesting TV report on the flight from Malaysia.

 

EXCLUSIVE: On board the Antonov

 

 

[hihosland]

impressive series of images at

 

An225 Aircraft preview

 

 

[onetrack]

Lots more info on the AN-225 trip to PER, in the link below ...

 

Antonov An-225 Mriya – World’s largest aircraft, to visit Perth (UPDATED WITH LATEST INFO)

 

Interesting to read about the need to spool the AN225 engines up over about 8 mins to stabilise them (to reputedly prevent compressor surge or stall, and a blown engine).

 

It seems that Soviet technology was behind the curve when they copied (reverse-engineered) the CF-6's, to build the AN124/AN225 engines.

 

As a result, it appears the turbine metal technology is not up to CF-6 levels, and the engine core temperature has to be brought up slowly to prevent damage.

 

I guess, seeing the era they were built in, it's a credit they are still running. Quite amazing to see the flight engineers huge consoles and their steam gauges - kind of reminds me of flying on the B707 in the 1960's.