Ryan
Court Jester
Since there are some United/Airplane buffs here, I thought some would appreciate this.
Living just 6 miles from BWI, watching airplanes fly over isn't unusual around here - but a few weeks ago, while standing at the local ice cream joint enjoying a tasty treat I saw a 747 fly low overhead lining up to come in at BWI. Now that IS unusual, so when I got home, I checked it out, through a combination of Flightaware and United's website figured out that the aircraft in question was N194UA, and that it arrived at BWI from IAD, just across the river in Virginia.
My curiosity fully awake, I started looking at flight histories, and it appears to be chartered by the US Government, as a lot of the airports it called on were Air Force bases (and there's a decent military airlift component here at BWI. Setting alerts for the flight number and tail number, I got a feel for the plane's schedule, and saw that it did seeming routine positioning moves from IAD to BWI on Tuesday evenings (most of the time after sunset) before a late night/early morning departure for Rammstein AFB.
As I was leaving work tonight, I got the email alert I was waiting for. A flight plan had been filed for UA1891, scheduled into BWI at 8:20, about 30 minutes before sunset. GAME ON!!!
When I got the alert (by frantically refreshing) that the flight had left on its 22 minute odyssey, I was nearly home from Alexander's rugby practice - I told him we were going to make a pit stop to see something cool. BWI has a very nice park/viewing area right at the threshold of runway 32L, which is the usual runway for landings (and was in use tonight). Firing up the LiveATC app on my phone, I heard the tower warning departures that there was a "747 heavy, down low crossing your path", so I knew that time was running short. The flight got cleared to land just as we were pulling into the parking lot - just enough time for us to bail out of the car and start taking pictures (he had already gotten my camera bag from the back seat and swapped lenses for me).
15 seconds later, it was all done and both of us were exchanging high fives and acting like fools, and awesome (step)Father and (step)son moment.
That thing was HUGE, and right there!
http://www.flickr.com/photos/rstavely/sets/72157634332945146/
Living just 6 miles from BWI, watching airplanes fly over isn't unusual around here - but a few weeks ago, while standing at the local ice cream joint enjoying a tasty treat I saw a 747 fly low overhead lining up to come in at BWI. Now that IS unusual, so when I got home, I checked it out, through a combination of Flightaware and United's website figured out that the aircraft in question was N194UA, and that it arrived at BWI from IAD, just across the river in Virginia.
My curiosity fully awake, I started looking at flight histories, and it appears to be chartered by the US Government, as a lot of the airports it called on were Air Force bases (and there's a decent military airlift component here at BWI. Setting alerts for the flight number and tail number, I got a feel for the plane's schedule, and saw that it did seeming routine positioning moves from IAD to BWI on Tuesday evenings (most of the time after sunset) before a late night/early morning departure for Rammstein AFB.
As I was leaving work tonight, I got the email alert I was waiting for. A flight plan had been filed for UA1891, scheduled into BWI at 8:20, about 30 minutes before sunset. GAME ON!!!
When I got the alert (by frantically refreshing) that the flight had left on its 22 minute odyssey, I was nearly home from Alexander's rugby practice - I told him we were going to make a pit stop to see something cool. BWI has a very nice park/viewing area right at the threshold of runway 32L, which is the usual runway for landings (and was in use tonight). Firing up the LiveATC app on my phone, I heard the tower warning departures that there was a "747 heavy, down low crossing your path", so I knew that time was running short. The flight got cleared to land just as we were pulling into the parking lot - just enough time for us to bail out of the car and start taking pictures (he had already gotten my camera bag from the back seat and swapped lenses for me).
15 seconds later, it was all done and both of us were exchanging high fives and acting like fools, and awesome (step)Father and (step)son moment.
That thing was HUGE, and right there!
http://www.flickr.com/photos/rstavely/sets/72157634332945146/
Memories are made of this! Priceless! :wub:
