Spotter's Log: MCO, Part 1 - JetBlue

I can't wait until winter arrives. The cold weather makes for good, healthy spotting. Spotting during the summer in Florida is just asking for a heat stroke.

Due to the pressing need to do my Thermodynamics homework, clean my room (ha!) and do my laundry, the 26 August 2007 spotting blog will be broken up into three chapters.

First, a history

As a counterpart to Southwest's exclusive Boeing 737 fleet, JetBlue's fleet is made up of Airbus A320s and Embraer E-190s. Southwest, being a much older airline, at the time had a choice between a Boeing 737 or a DC-9/MD-80 from McDonnell-Douglas. They went with the 737 and never looked back, and to this day are still taking deliveries for the 737NG.

JetBlue came in around the mid 1990s, when founder David Neeleman began shopping for a point-to-point vehicle for his new airline. He first went to Boeing for their 737s, but apparently the business/marketing people at Boeing didn't take his proposition seriously. Boeing was getting large orders from Delta and other carriers, and in my humble opinion, probably didn't think too much about this little low-cost startup. The price that Boeing wanted for the planes was much higher than Neeleman anticipated, and they could not come to an agreement.

Neeleman then went to Airbus, who was skeptical at first about Neeleman's intention (e.g. going to Airbus as a leverage for a lower price on the 737s). Eventually, the two companies came to an agreement, with Airbus willing to do all of the custom job that Neeleman wanted. Even though the price was still a little high, Neeleman was satisfied and agreed to go with Airbus.

When Boeing found out about the purchase, their business people called Neeleman asking him to reconsider. They even offered a much lower price for the 737s. But Neeleman said he had already shook on the deal, so Boeing lost a lucrative sale.

Apparently Boeing's business sector had a short term memory, because they committed the same mistake with Frontier Airlines 5 months afterwards. Frontier Airlines now has a mostly Airbus A319 fleet.

Moral of the story?

It doesn't matter if you have the right equipment on sale for the job, all it takes is a group of ignorant businessmen to f*** everything up.

A link to the A.net discussion can be found here.

Awww...

I think only female spotters will say that certain planes are "adorable" or "cute". To the guys, the plane is a thing of power, grace, and..., uh, power. But the word "adorable" will almost never enter their vocabulary of description.

As for me, the 737s and the A320s are essentially cute as a whale, and obviously I'm not the only one who thought of such a resemblance.

Image taken from Airliners.net
Photo taken by Phil Hyde
Link to original A.net page

To enhance their cuteness, JetBlue assigned names to all of their planes, usually with some regards to the color blue. I'm sort of collecting them. A.net has most of them in the database, but I want to see how many JetBlue planes I get to fly/spot within the next few years.

Below is a list of names that I've seen so far (excluding today's trip, and incomplete, as I still have quite a few spotting photos from JFK that I haven't gone through):

Idlewild Blue (spotted at TPA)
For the Love of Blue (spotted at MCO)
Major Blue (spotted at JFK, prior to A380 arrival)
Blue Moon (spotted at JFK, prior to A380 arrival)
Usto Schulz (I RODE IN IT! FIRST JETBLUE/A320 EXPERIENCE!)

Triplets of Blueville

Name: Devil with a Blue Dress On
Tail No.: N570JB
Arrival: 1513h Zulu
Runway: 17L

Name: Blue Yorker
Tail No.: N605JB
Arrival: 1524h Zulu
Runway: 17L

Name: Blue Loves Ya, Baby?
Tail No.: N644JB
Arrival: 1430h Zulu
Runway: 17L

Skylog: Lightning

Well, I wasn't as lucky as Sergio in his lightning shots. However Space Coast has been experiencing some really neat cloud to cloud lightning. So one night, while photographing a rock band at Port Canaveral, I couldn't resist snapping some of the outdoor elements.

TOO LOW!!! (but just barely made it)

A low, LOW, WAY TOO DANGEROUS approach of a KLM 747. Taken from the famous Princess Juliana Airport at St. Maarten.

No, seriously. When a 380 metric ton plane is moving at 130 MPH and is less than 12 feet above you, there really is such thing as BEING TOO CLOSE.
What a normal landing looks like:

A Day In The Life...

Engineers working in the defense industry face the same amount of stress as engineers working for a Silicon Valley company. However after working in both environment, I honestly feel that working at NG can be more stressful than Apple at times.

I found, as I worked with different software groups at NG, that developers tend to pick on each other to alleviate stress. I don't know why, but it does save you from the brink of insanity.

Scenarios

The following scenes have been dramatized for humorous effect. However, rest assured they have transpired throughout my almost ONE YEAR of working at NG (holy crap has it been that long?!).

An aphorism for every morning (as quoted by Crionofarr):

Coffee is the word for god on the minds and lips of every hapless engineers.

One day with a test engineer about someone else's code:

Co-worker: So, how well do you know the code that Aldo wrote?
Me: Well, I only just looked at it a couple of days ago.
Co-worker: Oh good, so you're an expert.

Prior to product delivery, lead/manager tends to check up on the underlings frequently...sometimes more often than it is healthy.

Co-worker: Good mornin'.
Me: If you keep coming in here every morning I'm going to start developing hives when you're around.
Co-worker: ... Well, nice to see you too.

And last but not least:

Co-worker: I know you're a horrible programmer, but can you for once in your life disprove that claim?!
Me: Well, I'm not fired yet.