Yes, I'm totally quoting my own post. No, it's not any significant news. However, I just realised that this was 9V-SKA. The first A380 delivered to SIA, the plane that flew the A380's first commercial flight. Just thought that was kind of cool.
Hmm, British Airways has the 763 scheduled to operate the LHR-YYC flights from October 26 to November 18. Replacing the newly introduced 788 for that time.
We've always heard the BA has been having a tough go of it in YYC, and the thinking was that the more efficient 788 could make the route better for BA. However them choosing to sub in the less efficient 763 again for a stretch seems to be an odd move.
Could this indicate the beginning of the end of BA in YYC (again)? Or is there a much less dramatic reason for the temporary change out (788 maintenance schedules)?
United's first 787-9 is up and about as well, they are the first North American carrier to fly the lengthened Dreamliner. Air Canada has 22 of these on order, the first should be here in July of next year.
It's funny about the contrails... I used to live in Yarmouth, Nova Scotia and depending on the jetstream you'd get a crazy amount of jet traffic overhead going to/from the east coast and Europe. But even on those days where ~50 contrails really spread out and linger, it's such a thin layer so high up that it really doesn't change the weather and stop stuff from growing as these morons claim.
I've been watching the old ATC tower at YYC get taken down, and keep wondering this: if the new runway has been a part of the "master plan" since the '70s, and that tower was commissioned in 1988, WHY was that tower built in the wrong place??
Perhaps at the time they figured the new parallel was pretty far off and from a cost/benefit they could get buy building that tower (which was in a perfect position to view all 3 runways and taxiways at the time). 1988-2014 is a pretty long run, and the new tower definitely cost more to build with its extra height.
Probably cheaper at the time since it didn't need to be that high in that location. Similar to how we finish the ring road interchanges in phases due to cost.
Cost/benefit is definitely the answer. At 300+ feet, the new tower is the tallest in the country and twice as tall as the old one. Tough to justify that in 1988.
