When I heard that Ethiopian Airlines’ Dreamliners would be
coming to Cameroon from the month of October, I was elated. So the next time I
was scheduled to work on Ethiopian, I made a request to our Ethiopian Airways
Swissport supervisor to post me on the ramp…
“CY, I brought my camera. I want to take photos of the plane
and write about it!”
“Ah, okay. So Nkiacha, position 4, Ramp safety.”
“Yes! Great.”
So a few hours later I was on the ramp, waiting for the
arrival of the aircraft. And at about its estimated time of arrival, I spotted
it in the sky blinking and approaching. As the world’s biggest Boeing
airplane, the 787-8 Dreamliner landed, I announced it over our radio, took out
the camera for the first landing shot and…Oops! It couldn’t switch on! Damn it.
“Come on, you’ve never done this to me! So you want to spoil
my Dreamliner photo plans abi?” I slapped it gently. Nothing. Okay back to work.
The first thing I noticed about the state-of the-art aircraft
is how gigantic it is. I used to consider the Swiss Air and Air France’s Airbus
330 planes big but the Dreamliner is bigger. It is colossal, with a max
take-off weight of 227.930 kgs. The length is 57 metres, wing span 60 metres
and interior cabin width 574 cm. Now that is a flying mansion! And it is very
beautiful too; white, spotless, majestic, even sexy. With its
sharp tapering nose which is evocative of Concorde’s.
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| Nose |
Other Stats
Fuel capacity: 126.903 litres
Range: 14.500 km
Typical cruising speed at 35.000 feet
Thrust per engine at sea level: 64.000 pounds
The second observation I made is how “quiet” it is. The
plane doesn’t make noise that much. It lands, taxies on the ramp silently and
parks silently such that, if you are not looking at it, you’ll barely even notice
that a plane has landed. You don’t really need an ear defender when working
around it. The other smaller Boeing and Airbus planes make noise well. Not to
mention those small archaic propeller planes (like those in the Rambo jungle
movies) that fly to Malabo, with reactors that rotate and shatter the air with
their deafening, ear splitting noises, “praaaa-pra-paaaa-paaa-papaaaapa” like a
million primary school children and seek attention all over the place and if
you don’t close your ears you will develop deafness.
The Dreamliner’s greatness is due to an improved engine and
fuel efficiency improvisation. This contributes to 20% reduction in fuel
consumption and emissions thus it is environmentally friendlier than the
previous versions.
It is also going to be Ethiopian’s flagship aircraft. Okay,
statistics move away, let me find my camera. Then it hit me. Try something,
anything. I removed the battery and put it back in. I switched it on and….it worked!
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| Reactor |
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| Rear view of reactor |
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| Wheels |
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| Offloading |
I earlier said it’s gigantic right? But look at this. The
1.77m tall Nkiacha stood underneath the aircraft and his head couldn’t even reach
the plane’s "belly"!
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| Underneath the aircraft |
Okay, take off time. I have to position myself perfectly for
the photo. And as its speeding away furiously like a rhinoceros, I’m focusing
and estimating exactly where lift off is going to be but oh, I got it wrong,
there are baggage containers barring my vision and I begin running away from
those containers to get the plane back in sight and focusing to get the perfect
shot and…..yes
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| Take off |
As the biggest Boeing airplane in the world pierces the
afternoon sky and soars away like an eagle, I ponder about aerodynamic lift and
admire the peak moment in aviation –takeoff.
