Greetings!

 While the majority of all my pictures feature things with wings, it has been quite a long time since I devoted an entire essay to things with very big wings.  While some of you may remember seeing a few of these images before,  I hope you will agree they are worth sharing with newer “subscribers”.

 The Frontier Airlines Airbus A320 in picture #1 actually has some of the smaller wings in this set, but the Pileated Woodpecker on the tail must be one of the biggest pictures of a bird anywhere! 

With picture #2 we have some significantly bigger wings.  The aircraft is a Lockheed L-1011 Tristar.  Its first career was as a civil airliner, but it was then converted into an aerial tanker/transport for the Royal Air Force.  This picture was taken shortly before they were permanently retired, and like all the pictures in this set, it was taken from our balcony. 

Living almost directly in line with the main runways of Dulles airport offers some great views of aircraft on approach and departure.  Most of those are civil airliners, with a sprinkling of military and government use machines such as this Tristar.

 The Tristar started as a civil aircraft and was converted to military use, but the aircraft in the next three pictures all started as military aircraft but are now on the civil register.  They flew past the balcony not because of the proximity of Dulles, but because the Potomac River, which is also very close to our home, offered a convenient route for aircraft participating in a major flypast of American WW2 aircraft,  a little over two years, to get from their formation point near Leesburg airport to their destination – Washington DC.  Arguably the quintessential types, #3

is a P-51 Mustang,

#4 is a B-17 Flying Fortress,

and #5 is a B-29 Superfortress.

A the time, Fifi was the only  airworthy B-29 in the world.  Since then another B-29, Doc, has also been restored to airworthy status.

 As a bridge back to civilian types to civil types, #6

shows an Alaska Airlines aircraft in a livery “Honoring Those Who Serve”.

 #7 shows a Lufthansa 747.  Recently, Lufthansa has added a blue “cheatline” to the formerly plain white fuselage of at least some of their 747s, giving them a distinctly “retro” look.  In fact, the first time I noticed one in the new livery, I thought I was in a time warp and was seeing a 707!

I don’t know if this was a deliberate reminder of the past, but several US airlines have paid homage to their history by reviving older color schemes.  #8 is not a “revival” livery, but Alaska Airlines did apply this special livery to one of their 737s to honor Boeing’s 100th birthday!

 In a similar vein, Air China put a special livery on one of their 777s to celebrate 50 years of diplomatic ties between China and France (picture #9).

 #10 shows a colorful 777 of Qatar Airways, which they decorated to emphasize their sponsorship of the FC Barcelona soccer team.

 With #11 we come almost full circle, with a picture of another Frontier Airlines Airbus, this time an A319, with a Wolf on the tail.  Frontier have applied animal pictures to the tails of many – if not all – their aircraft.

 This Wolf is called Lobo, while the Pileated Woodpecker in picture #1 is Weston.

 This week’s final picture, #12, is an old favorite of mine.  Capturing this South African Airways Airbus A340 as it passed in front of the moon while departing from Dulles (hence going right-to-left rather than left-to-right) just as the sun was setting on a late October afternoon was a lucky accident, especially since the optical distortion of the hot and turbulent jet exhausts have distorted the edge of the moon!

 Have a great week!