Our civil association Airliners.sk, o.z. is constantly cooperating with airlines at different levels. Communication is the foundation of success, so we do not spend too long to reach the representatives of any carrier. In the past, you’ve been able to read a few great reports on our site and now it’s time for another story.
Airline Qatar invites us again to take a tour of one of their aircrafts. In April it was Dreamliner in Vienna, this time we traveled to Munich for Airbus A350-900, which does not fly to Vienna yet on Qatar lines.
It is Friday 28.10.2016, 22:00, the first crew of our colleagues launches under Tatry. It is almost a long way to go through the Bratislava core of the association. Saturday, 02:30 leaves the crew of the second car from Bratislava, and half an hour later the crew of the car number 3. On the way to Austria, it started to rain and as we were disappointed to find out later, the rain and fog were also enjoyed in the destination destination. Around eight o’clock in the morning, we gathered all three cars at the airport in Munich at the southern runway on a “Spotter Hill”. Foreign members of our team arrived by aircraft. All happily together in unfortunate weather. The fog, the drizzle, the poor visibility have been signed by each of us. We wanted to take the air traffic before we headed to Qatar’s terminal, but the weather had a reluctant attitude. We were also disappointed with all the servers that have consistently claimed to be polluted. Today, however, no one guarantees anything. We’ve made some shots despite the weather, but we’ll get a separate report.
Weather has begun to getting better just in the afternoon. However, we were waiting at the Qatar representative’s terminal at the agreed time, the second afternoon. For a moment, the organizational hustle of the carrier was scared by us, where the human factor had barely failed. We almost did not managed to visit the plane. But everything was quickly explained, and we were already walking through the corridors for ID cards to enter the airport area. Procedure as always: ID card, subsequent check-in and check. After completing these processes, we walked across the airport to the A350 Airbus A350 A7-ALC. Our eagerness was quite understandable – our guide even failed to get rid of it and we were already shooting the cameras. But he quickly corrected us, because the plan was to first inspect the interior of the aircraft. So we went up the stairs to the take-off bridge and from there to the Airbus.
Right from the beginning, we got OK to walk through whole pane. We’re entering a cockpit that resembles the one in Dreamliner. There is no wonder, both aircraft are state-of-the-art aeronautics and the latest technology technologies are almost united. However, the two cockpits are dominated by large screens, which are quite similar.
We continue to look at the passenger spaces. Aircraft in configuration for Qatar has two classes. Business class has 36 seats, which is 14 more compared to their Boeing 787. In the economy class there are 247 seats arranged in lines 3-3-3, B787 has 232 seats in economy class. There are 283 passenger seats, or 29 more than Dreamliner Qatar. But it is not at the expense of space. At first glance, the A350 makes a bigger impression, the B787 is more compact. The A350 is just a bigger aircraft. In the business class, the seats are configured with a 1-2-1 system, with the middle pair of seats being separated from each other by a bulkhead. Everyone here finds a removable saddle with a remote control, a large display in front and the appropriate comfort. The economic class also offers large screens. Passengers in the airplane have all the standard equipment that can be expected: music, movies, games, internet.
Business class – comfort for more demanding
Economy class – even here the passengers can see the view from the camera
The last door of the airplane left us open and there were mobile stairs. We could take off the plane from the side, the rudder and the view of the area from the platform outside the door. But we could not go anywhere below. We went back inside, passed through the airplane and through the front door and the vestibule “sleeves” out and back down the stairs down the road. From the airport area, we saw the airplane look beautiful from below. Everything here was clean, the plane is still quite new. In the photos you can see all the details – engines, chassis, flaps, wings. The bad weather was at this moment definitely gone, just ponds left on the ground.
The movement under and around the plane allowed us to take pictures of neighboring stands, so we shot the S7 Airbus A321, Boeing 737 Hapag-Lloyd, or the A380 Emirates.
Time was running really fast, the plane has already been waiting for passengers to fly to Doha. We thanked the representative of Qatar and left the area. But our program has not ended. We had a plan to visit the Besucherpark on the same day at the airport in Munich, and after another night we were waiting for another day, which we reserved for our spotter hobby. But this is soon in the next article.
Text a foto: NK, DD, RH
