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Being back home in NL ensured I had some time to edit my last batch of pictures taken during my family vacation in France. Here’s an impression of a road trip on 30 July to Tarbes-Lourdes, Toulouse-Francazal and Toulouse-Blagnac. And finally, one picture taken at Chateauroux during our lunch break on the drive back to NL.
Anyway, enough with all the introduction, time for the pictures. I first drove to Tarbes-Lourdes where the weather was really not so good. It was a mere 16 C with low clouds and occasional rain.
I first started spotting outside the departure area of the terminal (parking in front of the terminal is free for seven days, so don’t worry about that). From the departure area you can have a good look at the apron in front of the Tarmac Aerosave hangar and its scrapping area. As I’m not into number logging and only photographing I don’t have all the numbers. But currently parked on that side of the airport is quite some aircraft including Air France, Etihad and Lufthansa A380s, Avianca A330, easyJet A320s, a former British Airways/Comair B737-800, A320s of Air Côte d’Ivoire, Arik Air A330, DHL A300, Corsair A330, HiFly A380, LATAM A350, TAP A321, Virgin Australia A330, Vietnam Airlines B777, South African A340 and Air France B777s.
Of these, the following could be reasonably photographed with 200-400 mom. Due to the cool weather, heatwaves were almost not an issue.
1. One of the A350 prototypes, this F-WZNW, was already seen by me last year when I was at Tarbes-Lourdes but is looking even more sad since then:
A359-AIB-FWZNW-LDE30jul21 by Anton Homma, on Flickr2. Air France B777-200ER F-GSPR (a new one for me…), was retired by the airline on 25 April 2021 and ferried to LDE on 17 May 2021.
B772-AFR-FGSPR-LDE30jul21 by Anton Homma, on Flickr3. This brand new A350-1000 for BA is to become G-XWBI. It had its first flight on 21 June 2021 and was ferried to LDE for storage exactly one month later. It is registered F-WZNC.
A351-BAW-FWZNC-LDE30jul21 by Anton Homma, on Flickr4. This white whale is 9H-MIP the former colorful A380 of HiFly Malta. It is now parked at the scrapping area of the Tarmac Aerosave apron, which doesn’t bode well for the aircraft. It has been parked at LDE since 16 March 2021.
A388-HFL-9HMIP-LDE30jul21 by Anton Homma, on Flickr5. A330-200 OO-SFT of Brussels Airlines has been returned to its lessor and arrived at Tarbes-Lourdes on 15 January 2021. It is now registered N246GE.
A332-BRU-N246GE-LDE30jul21 by Anton Homma, on FlickrThen it was time to drive to the industrial area alongside the southern part of the airport where a line-up of aircraft is parked very close to the fence. Since my last visit in August last year, things have been shuffled around a bit. New arrivals here are an all white former Virgin Australia A330, a TAP A330, six A330s of Finnair, six A320/A321s of Finnair and a few white A320s/A321s. Still present are two SAA A340s, a National Airlines A330, a former HiFly A340-500 and a Lufthansa A380. Very nice now is that they moved the former Brunei Government A340-200 to the line in front of the fence from the Tarmac Aerosave apron, making it easy to photograph. The seven present A350s of Hainan Airlines have now all been grouped together and moved away from the fence line and are on the apron near the terminal.
Anyway, here are the pictures taken at this side:
1. A line-up of five A330-300s of Finnair:
A333-FIN-OHLTO-LDE30jul21-2 by Anton Homma, on Flickr2. The most colorful one is of course this OH-LTO with the additional Marimekko-stickers:
A333-FIN-OHLTO-LDE30jul21 by Anton Homma, on Flickr3. Former Brunei Government A340-200 V8-001 is now in a better spot for photography. It wears no titles and registration by the way:
A342-BRN-V8001-LDE30jul21 by Anton Homma, on FlickrThen I followed the road to the other side of the airport. Last year you could drive and walk up to the fence there of the Tarmac Aerosave apron but this year that proved to be a challenge. They have planted corn right next to the fence and being late July it has grown very large making walking through it quite difficult (especially after rain). However, most disappointing is that they have erected a very large earth wall right behind the fence which means the view is now blocked onto that apron. Bugger….
Anyway, after that disappointing find, it was time to begin the 1,5 hour drive towards the Toulouse-area where I first stopped at Francazal. Not being able to photograph but maybe of interest to know is that there is also a Sriwijaya Air B737-800, a Jazeera A320neo, two Chengdu Airlines A320s and a bunch of ATRs from Jet Airways, Far Eastern Air Transport, Indigo etc. What could be photographed this day were:
1. This ATR72-600 F-WWEM is destined for Wings Air and is wearing a special 80th ATR for Lion Group-livery:
ATR72-WGS-FWWEM-FRC30jul21 by Anton Homma, on Flickr2. Two “normal” Wings Air ATR72s could be photographed, including this F-WWEE:
ATR72-WGS-FWWEE-FRC30jul21 by Anton Homma, on Flickr3. A newly baked ATR72 is this F-WWEC which is awaiting painting:
ATR72-UNK-FWWEC-FRC30jul21 by Anton Homma, on Flickr4. As BRA has reduced its operations severely due to Corona, this ATR72 F-WWEZ is waiting at Francazal for more than a year now to be delivered:
ATR72-BRA-FWWEZ-FRC30jul21 by Anton Homma, on Flickr5. The nicest surprise was actually found tucked away in a corner, this B737-700 T7-WLA of Wings of Lebanon, which has been present at Francazal since August last year:
B737-WLB-T7WLA-FRC30jul21 by Anton Homma, on FlickrAnd that was that, time to move to Blagnac, which was really quiet being a (late) Friday afternoon. I made a quick stop on the spotters hill where I managed to capture these:
1. This A330-900N F-WWCC was originally destined to go to Garuda but is now not taken-up and awaiting things to come:
A339-UNK-FWWCC-TLS30jul21 by Anton Homma, on Flickr2. A350-900 F-WZGT is to go to China Southern as B-324R in the not so far future:
A359-CSZ-FWZGT-TLS30jul21 by Anton Homma, on Flickr3. And the only aircraft doing a test-flight during my stop was this A320neo F-WWIE which is going to BA as G-TTNN:
A320N-BAW-FWWIE-TLS30jul21 by Anton Homma, on FlickrAnd then it was time to drive the 200 km back to the vacation house and enjoy the rest of the vacation until 4 August when it was time to go home again. On the way back we made a lunch-stop at Chateauroux where only one new aircraft could be photographed compared to my stop on 20 July (see also that topic on this forum):
1. A330-300 HS-XTJ of Thai Air AsiaX has been retired on 29 April 2021. It arrived at Chateauroux being returned to its lessor CDB on 29 July. It was officially registered as OE-IEB on 2 August but was still wearing HS-XTJ when I saw it on 4 August.
A333-ASX-HSXTJ-CHX4aug21 by Anton Homma, on FlickrThat’s all folks! Hope you liked it.
Cheers!
