(Note: The text below is from a posting that I made for my Photo A Day (PAD) project in January of 2015. It has been updated to include later events up to the time of writing in August 2022. I've also included a copy of the photo in the below-mentioned Sydney Aviation gallery, so if you're seeing this photo there... well, that explains that.)

What I hate about PADing is the fact that so many days you have to find A subject, ANY subject, with whatever time (and inclination) you have at your disposal. On other days you go on a proper photoshoot and you have hundreds, literally hundreds, to choose from. It's a famine (usually) or feast (rarely) project.

Today I went up to Kyeemagh, a suburb just opposite the runways that jut out into Botany Bay. It's about as close as you can get to the main 16R/34L runway, if one counts about 1.6km from the touchdown point as "close", although if you go right to the end of the Kyeemagh breakwater the distance to the runway is about half a kilometre. Though at that range the dramatic touchdown is history and the aircraft are just placidly taxiing past... as we see here.

Is this my favourite of the batch? I'm not sure; I don't think there is one, and others will appear in my Sydney Aviation gallery in due course. It gets the nod mainly because of the sky colour and the smoothness of the aircraft against the hard lines of the cranes at Port Botany.

This is Qantas A380-800 (A380-842) VH-OQE, flying the QF2 Dubai to Sydney route. That originated at London's Heathrow, so it's had a long, long trip. Note: This was true in 2015, but since 2018 the QF1/QF2 route has gone via Singapore instead of Dubai. That's still a hike and a half.

Qantas is one of only three airlines which operates the A380 in significant numbers (which I'm calling 20 or more firm orders), the others being Emirates (far and away the biggest operator) and Singapore Airlines.

(Edit: Qantas' orders weren't quite as firm as they appeared at the time. In the end Qantas purchased only 12, one of which has since been disposed of. As of August 2022 five are in service, and six are in storage because travel demand has yet to recover. Part of that is because both airlines and airports have not rebuilt staffing levels, making the entire flying experience fubar with flight cancellations, lost luggage, endless lines, etc, etc.)

Air France, BA and Lufthansa have only about a dozen each and as far as I know the aircraft hasn't cracked the US market at all. (And with Boeing being a US company, I suspect that a dim view would be taken if it ever did.) I read an article in The Economist not so long ago about the possibility that these behemoths might not be long for the world; sales have been very flat with a large number of cancellations since airlines prefer smaller twin engine jets which were cheaper to run and more flexible. As a result Airbus is losing money on the deal and unless some new buyers can be found fast they may have to wind up the production line.

(Edit: That came to pass on 16 December 2021 when Emirates received its 123rd and last A380. This was the 251st airframe delivered, not counting three prototypes. Wikipedia reports that as of June 2022 there were 239 aircraft in service with 16 operators, but I don't know whether that number factors in the number that are "parked" like 6 of Qantas' ones as mentioned above. BA has 11 in service, Qatar 8 with another 2 parked, Emirates has 119 after disposing of 4, but "only" 75 are operational, Lufthansa has 8, but all parked, Air France has disposed of all 10 it had (as has Etihad, which had the same number), Korean Air has 3 active and 7 parked, China Southern has 2 and 1... and so it goes. At the time of release Airbus predicted 1,500 sales; obviously the reality fell way short, and apparently the development costs weren't covered.)

Still, the A380s make a pretty impressive sight when they rumble past, and the ones that are already out there aren't going away any time soon.

And with that, yet another bloody month is over. Unnnn-believable...

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