Steve & Grant discuss all the latest news items that were of interest over the past couple of weeks. Steve also gets to have a few “c’est la vent” moments on some topics that were annoying him.
As if all that wasn’t enough, we also have a chat with Owen Zupp and reveal the winner of our first ever give away competition. Sorry, you’ll have to listen to the episode to discover who were the close runners up and who was the winner :)
So, sit back, relax and enjoy episode 16, in which we discuss:
- Jetstar engine fire forces evacuation at Newcastle airport (ABC News)
- Victoria launches bid for Red Bull Air Race (Australian Aviation)
- We both express displeasure that the Red Bull Air Race was not available online via web-streaming for Australians despite Channel 10 not showing it live
- V Australia to get 777-200LRs?
- We discuss Air New Zealand replacing its 737-300’s with A320’s
- Air New Zealand’s Chris Nassenstein Tapped For Qantas Post (Aero-News Net)
- We discuss the political turn-around associated Victoria trialling heavy jet fire bombers
- It seems that it’s not just in the USA that airline pilots make silly mistakes
- We chat with Owen Zupp about our recent competition, the runners up and the big winner
- David Vanderhoof provides a look at “this week in aviation”
- Qantas will not be ‘Jetstarised’: Joyce (The Age)
- We discuss the expansion of Tiger Airways as they open new routes
- Steve has a major “What Cheese Me Off!” session about the advertising for Melbourne Airport (you can see the adverts as a banner on the Melbourne Airport website
- We discuss JAL’s new premium economy class seating on the Sydney to Narita route (thanks to Dan Web for the lead)
- Final F-111 exits deep maintenance (Australia Aviation)
- Boeing completes Wedgetail counter-measures testing (Australian Aviation) (plus a ‘heads up’ by David Vanderhoof)
- We review some listener mail
As usual, our sound effects come from SoundSnap.com and our theme music track is “YouNameIt5″ by Brian Simpson (aka t3cat5).
hehe. so close !
Super great episode guys!! Highly interesting aviation news content, thank you so much!
What’s with the rant? I wanna hear you rant about ATC I dare you! not kidding, very angry,pilots suck!!!!!
Jeremy…I probably should have ranted about how your podcast donation ended up at No Agenda instead of us!?!
Grrrrrr…..
yep Delta operate 777-200LR into sydney as well as Emirates, Air Canada
Ha Ha! Steve I will be donating to PCDU when episode 50 comes out….
Thanks to all for the kind comments and to Matt for the 777 info.
As to Jeremy – ha ha, dude – we’ll be at episode 50 WAY before you think we will. Oh yes, we have some cunning plans :)
Well done guys, I agree with David as above. Great episode. By the way, congratulations for stimulating comments through the site with your speculations on why our local airlines ordered, and have on order, the aircraft they have.
I’ll share with you my recollections of these orders and at the same time, leave myself open to correction when and if I’m wrong.
Qantas – You were correct in mentioning QF opportunistically jumped on American’s cancelled 737 orders post 911 and good on them for it. A great break for them and a natural successor to the (at the time) existing -300s and -400s enabling a smooth transisiton over to the NG’s which is still going on today. They have also since topped up their 737-800 orders as well.
However, regarding the 330s, I believe the original birds were picked up for a song as part of the incentive to get on board with the 380s and again, good on them. However, you mentioned a shift to Airbus since QF wre formally an all Boeing Airline but you did forget to add that they also have 100 orders and commitments for Boeing 787 Dreamliners which will be their mainstay mid-ranger and render the 330s obsolete in time. The 330s being an ‘interim’ model for them and luckily so with all the 787 delays, hence the extra frames ordered since.
Air New Zealand – Also switching to Airbus? Hardly, the 320 is their default narrow body with 12 already in service of the original 15 ordered a few years ago. One was infamously lost during handover from a lease back in France a while ago and two of the orginal order were cancelled. The 73’s being -300s from the ninties (the last tranche being the last ever -300s built I might add.) Yes, it is true, even little old NZ can shake a deal (as can QF and as seen with the 737-300s) out of the OEM’s on the right occassion (a global economic recession being such an occassion) as seen with DJ’s Brett Godfrey looking for more 737NG’s at the moment. You may have aklreay seen that NZ are a big fan of winglets, being the launch customer of the 320 with “sharklets” (WTF) and retro fitting winglets to their 5 763’s.
You did mention the delayed ordered 787s (NZ being the launch airline for the -9) and whether they would ever get them but omitted the fact they have adding to their existing 8 777-200ER’s, 8 777-300ER’s on order to replace the 747-400s as the future flagship’s of NZ’s fleet.
Now see, it’s not only Steve that can rant. Cheers
Grant does the plan involve making the show 5 minutes long? When you get to episode 50 i will donate $50. Anyone else want to match?
Count me in Jezza, as long as it’s more than an hour. None of this shortcut stuff for the money :-) I’m putting my money where my mouth is – see above Yikes!
BTW the flight tracker on the Melb airport website is really quite poor – a little insulting really!
Steve can you add a link for this flight tracker you mentioned last episode for Europe???
OK guys….so the current plan for our ATC show is to release it as 32 individual two minute episodes.
Don’t worry Jeremy, I won’t tell Adam Curry!
Lets the money flow!
Cheers
Steve
Mike: Thanks for the excellent comments & clarifications on the aircraft orders. You’re right that QF got the A330’s as “lead-in” to the A380’s – deal sweeteners and handy training for the (eventual) A380 crews. As to the Kiwi A320s, yes, it’s not a switch as they already have them, but it is a change from Boeing even if only a small way.
For both QF & AirNZ, having the mixed Airbus & Boeing fleets certainly must help when negotiating prices, eg: “Well, we’re no stranger to the other guys, so maybe they’ll give us a better deal to come even more into their camp…” etc :)
Jeremy (& Mike) – no no, the cunning plan was not to reduce episode lengths. Heck, it usually takes us 5 or 10 minutes just to warm up on an episode (although Steve’s “individual string-ette” episode style for the ATC release is appealing :)
No, we’re going to do it right and get you the best content we can up to #50 and beyond. We have some great ideas for content and are saving our $$$ to help get it. We’ve also got some content that’s waiting to come out but needs me to get some time to work on it. I blame my crazy day job for most of the delay.
So lets see how quickly we can get to episode #50 while still maintaining high quality. We certainly have incentive to try now, eh? :)
You can call it a fund drive – 50 for 50. When you get there you have a large party with lots of alcohol because there will be so many donations including from Ben, I’ll apply a little pressure to him!!!
Mmmmm – 50 – 4 – 50
yup – that works – especially the booze bit :)
Good luck applying pressure to the Ipanator – could be messy… :)
I saw him at work yesterday, he was doing an extra shift (AD) so he’s on the big bucks!!