Roehris Aviation Pages - Gallery on the job

I was still fast asleep in my cozy Düsseldorf Arabella Sheraton double bed, when the sharp tone of the phone brought my dreams to a sudden stop. My first thoughts are better not to be written in this context, when - instead of the soultry voice of my girfriend I expected - a lady's voice flirted from the phone's earpiece that she is calling from "crew contact" (our crewing department), with a brandnew change in my duty plan. "I hope you have slept enough, it's gonna be a quick start! Are you ready to copy?" God damn... "Go ahead..:", I said. "Well, instead of your planned trip to Hurghada and back to Frankfurt, we want you to fly a subcharter flight for Air Berlin. The schedule is as follows: Check-in at Düsseldorf at 0905 Zulu, then a flight to Malaga and back, followed by a flight to Zurich and back." This was the very moment the adrenaline first kicked in this morning. I am gonna fly to my "homebase of my heart", Zurich airport, for the first time in an aircraft weighing more than 6 tons! "And it's gonna be the Airbus A300-600R. Got everything? Have a nice flight!" "Yes...yes.. sure...yes..cool...way cool!!" I stammered back. Wow - it's gonna be a good day! There's not many days in my young career where I have been all spruced up within a mere 30 minutes. Today was one of them. I quickly called my girlfriend to tell her about my luck, and arranged a transport to take her and a spotter friend of mine to the aircraft during turnaround at Zurich. And off I was. In the crew room, a magnificent picture: A crew of eight cabin attendants waiting for us to take them to the air. A whiff if longhaul feeling rushed through the air... Briefing took only minutes, and off we were, heading to our new "big bird". There's some pictures from the day, stemming from different sources (no source given = own picture). Hope you enjoy them as much as I did!
	A large bus picks us up at the Hapagfly crew room on Düsseldorf airport, and brings us to Stand V13. And as she stands there, I have to admit that I feel like a little kid on christmas. A new toy to play with... big grin
	Captain Dieter Schröder-Finckh and his crew of nine(!).
	An optical illusion: Which one is the real big bus, the one on the right side or the one behind the crew? Guess... :-)
	We enter the aircraft, and my first impression is overwhelming. Although the aircraft is just some eight meters longer than the A310, it's the different interior that makes this "large aircraft" feeling. Boarding is via the doors 2L and 4L, and when you enter at 2L, you step into the middle galley (imagine this... a large forward galley, an even larger aft galley, and a middle galley...after the two small cramped galleys on the Boeing 737)!
	A view from door 2L towards the back. And that's only the rear part of the cabin! If you swing your head left, you...
	...get to see the former business class part of the bird.
	And when you walk towards the pointy end of the aircraft, you look towards the front galley and the "front office with the magnificent views". :-)
	Captain Dieter Schroeder-Finckh enjoys the new bus as well.
	Some troubles arise when we are informed that the two "Air Berlin representative Cabin Atendants" who should accompany our "stews" according to our briefing sheet do not show up, and literally last second we are are informed that we will operate the flights without them. Okay, loadsheet change to a new Dry Operating Weight and Index (due to "only" eight cabin attendants, these figures change and a new loadsheet has to be printed). As Dusseldorf handling is not able to send us the loadsheet via ACARS (our "fax"), the handling agent has to pick it up in the office, and we take off with a delay. We then taxy to runway 05R, and minutes later we are in the air, testing how the bigger sibling of the A310 feels on controls. It's a "fatter" flight feel compared to the A310, a bit more aileron input needed, and you feel the "extra mass" you move, but it flies more stable due to its length. [File foto from another day, because no pictures were available from D-AIAX taxying at DUS/Photographer: Christian Schürmann]
	Soon we are in our cruising level, and enjoy the sun.
	After some hickups on the radio (it's hard to use the callsign "Air Berlin" when you are so used to the own one...), a relaxed F/O Rohrer smiles.
	Check this: Eight doors - that's a real aircraft! The progress page on the FMS CDU shows our cruising level FL350, our maximum level we could achieve at the moment with enough safety margin in the so-called "coffin corner" (this is the speed range between the stall speed as the lower limit, which rises the higher you fly, and the max mach speed on the upper side, showing the speed where mach buffeting is likely to start when flying faster), and our economical optimum level. Our flight plan route from here to Malaga is still 995NM long, and direct distance to the threshold at Malaga's Runway 14 is 892.4 NM at a bearing of 219 degrees. Our navigation is only 0.06NM inaccurate, and GPS is the primary means of nav update, nevertheless the Grostenquin VOR (GTQ) is auto-tuned as a backup on NAV 1 and NAV 2.
	At Malaga (LEMG), we have trouble with the handling. Iberia, who is usually our handling agent for Hapagfly, insists that this Air Berlin subcharter is being handled by the handling company that usually looks after the Air Berlin flights. But these guys are unable to print a computer loadsheet for us, forcing us to fill in a load- and trimsheet by ourselves. Hard work for a crew who is used to get prepared computer loadsheets for years... (we got lazy, I admit ;-) ). When we finally have the loadsheet ready, we call for the pushback, but unfortunately the handling agent finds out (after hanging around for half an hour) that they don't have a steering pin for the A300 (the ground crew has to interrupt the hydraulic pressure to the nosewheel during pushback, to be able to make turns, and therefore you need a pin to keep a hydraulic valve in closed position). Good lord... [File foto from Faro airport, because no pictures were available from D-AIAX at Malaga/Photographer: Paulo Carvalho]
	After we have solved this problem as well, we head off to runway 14, to rocket off towards the Sierra Nevada only minutes later, with a major delay of nearly one hour. "That's the way.. a-hah-a-hah...we like it!" [File foto from Faro airport, because no pictures were available from D-AIAX at Malaga/Photographer: Sergio Domingos]
	On the way back from Malaga, we already plan the next flight to Zurich, and decide to get fuel for both legs in Dusseldorf (so called through-tankering) in order to save time on the turnaround in Zurich.The operational flight plan shows all relevant data we need for our trip, such as fuel figures, expected takeoff and landing masses, passenger figures, routing and flight levels, as well as a wind analysis. Furthermore all necessary data to get to three alternate airports from Zurich is printed on the plan. The smaller paper is a so called "trip info", containing all necessary data for the handling agent to fill in the loadsheet for us, like the flight number, the above-mentioned Dry Operating Weight (DOW) and Dry Operating Index (DOI), maximum takeoff mass, takeoff fuel, trip fuel (planned fuel burn inflight), taxy fuel (planned fuel burn for taxying on ground before takeoff), and expected flight time.
	A nice visit from CA Grünthal while we cruise in flight level 350 above Madrid.
	And soon we are in the descent towards Düsseldorf, following an Air France Airbus 320 on the published arrival route.
	Düsseldorf Airport is clearly visible with its distinct parallel runways.
	Some special pictures for a crew member of ours...
	...who lives near here.
	A nice wingview - slightly different from the A310 wing with its larger wingtip fences (aka "winglets"). Düsseldorf's runway 23L touchdown zone is right above the window.
	Fully stabilized on short finals to runway 23R. [Photographer: G. Bogdan]
	Wallpaper picture! (click to get the picture in size 3072x2048 pixel / 711KB) [Photographer: G. Bogdan]
	About to start the flare. [Photographer: G. Bogdan]
	A picture perfect touchdown by Captain Schroeder-Finckh... [Photographer: Tamon Takeoka]
	... followed by a nice rollout. The A300-600R has a magnificent Takeoff and Landing performance. On this flight we need just 1600m of runway even in the lowest autobrake setting. [Photographer: Michael Nikel]
	We vacate the runway, and Dieter guides the big bus towards the terminal, while I quickly get a nice picture...
	...of Düsseldorfs main terminal and apron.
	No chance to catch up precious minutes, because ground handling loads the containers the wrong way, and we would be way too tail-heavy, even if we put all the passengers up front. So all of the containers need to be repositioned. Additionally, the passengers are boarded way too late, so we rush out again with more than an hour of delay. Now it's "my controls" for the next two legs to Zurich (LSZH) and back. [File foto from an earlier day, because no pictures were available from D-AIAX taxying out at DUS/Photographer: Joachim Eichner]
	While we are zipping with max speed towards south, my fellow spotter has positioned himself in Zurich to catch our arrival. Heavy inbound traffic urges us to fly an orbit over northern Switzerland on ATC request, and then we join the VOR DME 28 approach, soaring down just some miles from my living place at Winterthur.Home sweet homezone... :-) [Photographer: Tino Dietsche]
	Although the sun has set about 45 minutes ago, there is still enough light around, and weather is magnificent, so I would have no excuse for a bad landing, although it's my very first one in an A300-600R. But all my fears are in vain. A nice touchdown concludes my first ride, and after a short rollout, we vacante into runway 34. [Photographer: Tino Dietsche]
	Taxying in, we head for gate E35. [Photographer: Tino Dietsche]
	It's a bit like driving a long truck: You really have to be careful not to mow something down with the wings which protrude from the fuselage to a total wingspan of nearly 45 meters, or to leave the taxyway with the main gear in sharp turns. [Photographer: Tino Dietsche]
	But my driving and steering skills seem to be accurate enough to bring us to the gate. [Photographer: Tino Dietsche]
	Highly concentrated on the docking system which tells me about how far I have to taxy to be in a correct position. [Photographer: Tino Dietsche]
	Setting up the FMS and the navigation means for the short, nearly "ballistic", flight back to Düsseldorf. And once again my painter skills are tested, because we have to fill in our own trim- and loadsheet again. [Photographer: Tino Dietsche]
	Myself, a bit stamped in comparison to the first picture after nearly 12 hours of duty in a constant hurry for a schedule we cannot fulfil. [Photographer: Tino Dietsche]
	But Zurich's handling agents are brilliant: We turn around our longhaul bird in just 35 minutes, that ain't bad indeed. And after a roaring departure from runway 34, we join the the DEGES departure that leads us exactly overhead my living place. ATC soon has us turning towards north, because we climb like hell (max takeoff weight is 170.5 tons, and on this flight we had a takeoff mass of a mere 118 tons), with an average rate of 5000 feet per minute. [Photographer: Tino Dietsche]
	We zip back, overflying the black forest, the greater Frankfurt area, and are soon in the descent towards Barmen VOR, to finalize the day with an ILS approach to runway 23L this time. The last paperwork is done, and while we wait for the crew bus to pick us up again, I quickly sprint around the aircraft to catch a last glimpse of our nice bus.
	Chocked and "leashed" at the ground power unit (GPU).
	The smallest aircraft in the Air Berlin fleet is standing right beside our A300-600R, who was probably the largest aircraft flying for Air Berlin this day. :-)
	Good workhorse...
	...and wings to trust.
	The overnight flightline at Düsseldorf airport. Note the "light flick" over the Swiss Avro RJ's tail: It's the Hapagfly mechanic performing the walkaround during the 15 second exposure time. Oups, our crew bus is here. I've gotta go. Hope you enjoyed the pictures!