213rd fly-in, 14th December 2008: Seattle-Tacoma International Airport, Washington, United States (KSEA)



Starting out one day early in an Air-France Concorde from RAF Linton-on-Ouse, North Yorkshire, UK. (EGXU)


Preflight checks.




Winding up the Rolls-Royce engines, full reheat.






A nice clear winter's day.


Passing back over EGXU on a westerly heading.




Barrow-in-Furness is visible down on the left as we head out over the Irish Sea.


Crossing the Irish coast after raising the nose.


Mach 2.0


A nice shot of the 3D cockpit on the Concorde.


A last-look back at dry land as we start out across the Atlantic.


You can just make out the shimmer of sunlight on the water from 45,000ft.












Some time later..


Making landfall over the Newfoundland coast.


"Fly me to the moon.."


Passing over Lake Michigan.


Pulling some wide banking turns to scrub off speed.




Drooping the nose for better visual approach.


Field (KSEA) in sight.




Gear down, lining up for final approach.


Down safely, rolling out..






.. and clear of the main runway at Seattle.




Taxiing to the stand.


Shutting down until the time of the fly-in.




I log in half-way through the fly-in. Plenty of traffic at KSEA, as Mick points out.


I hop into my trusty Su-34 for a piece of the action.


That's four aircraft on approach and two waiting to take off (including mine).


Two light aircraft arriving.


An Airbus A320 (probably) lands.






My turn to take off..




Getting clear fast. ATC has hands full and I don't want to cause any trouble.






Crossing back high above the field. There are seven aircraft in this picture.


Tailing an A320. I wonder how that looked on the ATC radar scope?








Obligatory sun-glare shot.


Mt. Rainier emerges out of the haze.


Wheeling for a closer look.


Crossing the summit at 450kts. Hope any climbers are holding tight!




Plenty of vegetation in this National Park.


Mt. St. Helens (or what is left of it).


Screeching over the volcanic crater. Not much outgassing in evidence.




I guess this is what happens when your texture memory gets corrupted..


The clouds look fine, however.


En-route to Long Beach.






This fighter's cockpit takes some figuring out.


Long Beach. I'm sure it's supposed to be longer than this..


Gaining altitude and heading back towards Seattle.




These clouds are why I bought my Radeon HD 3850 graphics card.






Not far from the field now.


ATC has gone offline now, but it was well-received.


The Su-34 runs out of fuel, just a few nm from the field and I request an emergency landing.


Fortunately I'm in range with excess speed to lose via some high-G turns.


On final approach, a bit off-centre..


.. and down safely ..




.. with just enough kinetic energy to roll off the runway onto the apron.




That's enough excitement for one fly-in. Merry Christmas!