Well this is an unusual sight

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I did some research on how to declare a webcam in public restricted space (airfield) with no surveillance goal and no image recording. But it seems a camera has to be for surveillance, no gov site allows you to declare a camera that just shows a big green grass runway, trees, clouds and a windsock if you can't identify people. I'm sad for cameras if their only purpose in life is surveillance. Where is the poetry, just showing the beauty of the world?

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Nine years ago almost to the day, just as Trump was being inaugurated, I published a piece titled "The rise of neo-protectionism in aeropolitics" in which I was forecasting a backslide in the liberalization of international aviation. Trump just now announced decertifying the Canadian-made Bombardier aircraft until Canada certifies Gulfstream aircraft. Aviation safety is now being used as a coercive instrument in trade wars. Here's an excerpt from my Jan 2017 article. --- Global aeropolitics are a two-pronged affair. The first is preoccupied with the exchange of information and the harmonization of procedures to ensure the safe and efficient operations of air transport regardless of geography, language, culture and legal environment; it is mostly a technocratic concern governed by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO). The second deals with the oft-contentious bilateral state relations in air transport and the granting of the so-called "freedoms of the air", which is arguably about to be hit with a wave of neo-protectionism unprecedented since the 1947 Chicago Convention. Perhaps most notably, it originates from Western countries that used to be driving forces behind globalization and free trade. In the US, the election of Donald J. Trump on November 8, 2016, may also herald a series of changes in this aspect of global aeropolitics. The new administration is distinctively Jacksonian, as evidenced by W. R. Mead: suspicious of untrammeled federal power, skeptical about the prospects for domestic and foreign do-gooding including welfare at home, opposed to federal taxes, more enamored with the second amendment (the right to bear arms) than with the first (freedom of speech), and not so much at the helm of a political movement as it is wielding into an instrument of power a folk ideology and community of political feelings (what J. Hulsman calls the Rust Belt's "Springsteen Democrats"). Mead, a senior fellow at the U.S. Council on Foreign Relations, further describes the main goal of the Jacksonians’ hawkish populism to be "the physical security and the economic well-being of the American people". Their foreign policy is realistic, pessimistic, and honor-bound. Realism is, of course, related to realpolitik, and translates into a practical and scruple-free "us versus them" mentality that sharply favors U.S. interests, before North America, the West, and finally, the world, in that order; it is in a sense antagonistic to the globalist ideal of free and open trade as a mechanism for equalization. Pessimism implies a degree of skepticism towards the motives of foreign states, and distrust for supra-national organizations that set the tone for aeropolitics. The honor code demands a fair treatment from foreign countries that are involved in bilateral agreements with the US, and meets any temerity on their part with determined resistance that only escalates -even militarily- in the face of reprisals or confrontation. Regardless of how much Mead’s framework for Jacksonian politics applies to the new U.S. administration, further insight is to be found in Mr. Trump's own rhetoric: in April 2015, he declared, in the context of trade relations: "When you’re doing business — [...] ‘American exceptionalism', I don’t like the term. [...] first of all, I want to take everything back from the world that we’ve given them. We’ve given them so much". This could indicate a likely inclination of the new administration to scrutinize many of the pre-existing agreements - not just NAFTA and the One China diplomatic stance, but also the 111 Open Skies agreements that the US are party to. Existing and/or future air transport agreements may be revisited with a business-like approach, favoring arm's length, ad-hoc and transactional deals over more binding perennial partnerships. This stance marks a departure from the promotion of Open Skies by the previous administration; in March 2011, then-State Secretary Hillary Clinton had commented that "an Open Skies agreement has powerful benefits – fewer government restrictions, more competition, more jobs in the air and on the ground; more people trading, exchanging and interacting; cheaper flights, more tourists, new routes to new cities [...] Building a continuous airborne corridor of prosperity around the world is one of our goals". This statement was also in line with ICAO’s (2006) own assessment that "every $100 of output produced and every 100 jobs generated by air transport trigger additional demand of some $325 and 610 jobs in other industries". One possible way that this shift could manifest itself is in how the incoming administration will reconsider the arguments of the "US3" carriers (American Airlines, Delta Airlines, and United Airlines), who have been lobbying the U.S. administration against the alleged unfair competition from the "ME3" (Emirates Airline, Etihad Airways, and Qatar Airways). The two main requests of the US3 (formal consultations on Open Skies agreements with Qatar and the UAE, and a suspension of flights) were turned down by State Secretary John Kerry in mid-2016. Confrontation on this matter can have far-reaching ramifications. In 2010, when Canada refused Emirates and Etihad additional landing rights, the UAE "[closed] its airspace to Canada’s defense minister while he was in mid-flight, which forced a diversion, and [evicted] Canadian troops from a Dubai base they were using to support combat in Afghanistan. Canadian visitors to the U.A.E. were slapped with visa requirements" (Campbell, 2017). Coincidentally, Mr. Trump's inauguration as the 45th U.S. president happened on the last day of the 47th Davos World Economic Forum, which the president of China attended as a keynote speaker for the first time ever. In the same week, Jacksonian forces rose to power in the West while the forces of globalization shifted East. The world of aeropolitics may never be the same. ---

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Bored of aviation organisation software that is not free, often not better than side projects in terms of quality or support. So I started building my own. First step is an airfield webcam capture software running on Raspberry Pi. Simple, reliable, and easy to deploy. Next on the list is a club aircraft booking system, and possibly a lightweight accounting tool. The goal is to let pilots access their balance transparently, without layers of opaque software or licensing friction. Small tools, focused scope, built for actual users, not sales decks.

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Track SANTA1 (callsign HOHOHO, type sleigh) flying from XMS (North Pole) to XMS via circumnavigation at https://fr24.com/R3DN053/3d9fb50a

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pretty crazy that i can see the A320 landing light from my window on a clear night from 25 miles away

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A fuller picture is starting to emerge from the UPS flight 2976 accident on Nov. 4 in Louisville, KY. The left engine separated during the takeoff roll for reasons that are yet to be determined (installation error, undetected fatigue cracks, etc.). This was bad enough on its own, but survivable barring serious damage to the wing structure, including hydraulic lines and flight controls. The MD-11 could have taken off on the remaining two engines, albeit with some fine piloting given the asymmetric aerodynamics and thrust. What sealed the flight's fate, though, is that some debris was ingested by engine #2 (the one at the base of the vertical stabilizer), causing a compressor stall. With only one engine left running (#3), the MD-11 no longer had sufficient thrust to take off, circle around, and land. Whether this all happened before or after the decision speed (V1) at which takeoff can no longer be rejected is yet to be determined. Regardless, as long as the pilots only realized the situation after V1, there was nothing else they could have done to change the outcome; there was not enough runway to stop the plane before the hard obstacles anyway. Sadly, they were just passengers on their own flight by that point. There is one precedent of engine separation on a DC-10, which is of a similar trijet design as the MD-11. That was flight AA 191 in 1979; the left engine fell at takeoff due to incorrect maintenance. The accident killed 271 people on board and 2 more on the ground, and was the deadliest air disaster in U.S. history back then. I wouldn't be surprised by calls for an accelerated retirement of the remaining MD-11s in service; the one that crashed (N259UP) was 34 years old, a venerable age (FedEx, for one, plans to phase out its own MD-11s by 2032). Of the 200 MD-11s ever produced, only 56 remain in service today, and all in cargo operations (the last passenger service was in 2014).

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What is FL360 ? Search returns nothing for now, and no LLM at hand but I prefer the nice people here. Noob question? First time to hear about the term in https://farcaster.xyz/aviationdoctor.eth/0x9ed5f415

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A United Airlines B737–8 MAX flying from DEN to LAX got hit in the windshield by some unidentified debris while cruising at FL360 on Thursday. The aircraft diverted safely to SLC. Only minor injuries among the pilots due to glass fragments. This is the first such incident I’m aware of. It’ll be interesting to see if the investigation identifies the object — satellite debris, weather balloon, ice, part of another aircraft, micro-meteorite, etc. https://avherald.com/h?article=52e80701

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Been waiting for this and didn’t disappoint. United Starlink WiFi is amazing

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Love this new safety video by MAS https://x.com/MAS/status/1971956233646289212

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They added a new hard to find holding point on our taxi way.

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Good thing I lingered at home more than I normally would. My flight to Hong Kong is now canceled due to a tropical cyclone. Coincidentally, the same flight (UA 877) was also canceled four months ago, when it clipped wings with another plane while preparing for departure.

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While A350 and A220 get most attention, A330neo might be a big silent winner for Airbus. Especially its versatility in the high density Asia/Pacific routes.

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The Mirage of the Green Plane ✈️ Aviation promised carbon neutrality by 2050 through biofuels, hydrogen and offsets. In reality, these solutions remain marginal, costly and tied to fossil sources, while carbon capture offsets just 1% of global CO₂. Air traffic is booming again, with 5B passengers expected in 2025 and steady growth that could triple emissions by 2050. Instead of cuts, the sector leans on weak schemes like Corsia carbon credits, riddled with loopholes and dubious compensations. The EU is now investigating 20 airlines for greenwashing, yet regulation is delayed until 2031 and political caution dominates. France has opted for a kerosene tax, but globally aviation still enjoys broad exemptions. The dream of the “green plane” remains a mirage, while emissions keep climbing.

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