Bloggers’ MAS Plane Spotting

August 31, 2009 by thejessicat

Let’s go back in time when you were a little kid. Ever had a plane fly by you which got you all excited pointing at it soaring majestically across the sky? Well, I have.

Living near the Penang International Airport a decade ago, made me hear those roaring, thunderous sounds every other day.

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I’ve always wondered how it’s like to stand at the restricted area of the airport runways to watch a plane go by up close. Thanks to MAS Plane Spotting session, a group of 20 bloggers & photo enthusiasts were selected to experience it for ourselves, with police escort too!

bored
We were shooting away while he had nothing to do
I don’t blame him, do you? =P

It was insane for me (who despises early mornings) to drag myself outta bed to meet up with the rest at a very unearthly hour. Who wakes up at 6am on Saturday mornings? ROAR

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Jon, Yatz, Myself & Aaron

I arrived Sepang with Wings, Yats and Dale. We were situated atop a hill to shoot the the planes. Click the pictures below for a clearer panoramic view of different angles of the runway

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I reckon we were at the back end of the airport, as I saw lotsa cargoes being loaded onto the planes.

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All I shot were mostly the arrival of the airlines at top speed – instead of departing, as what we initially hoped it would be.

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Arrival of Air Asia!

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Arrival of Indian Airlines!

But all hope is not lost! All of us relocated from Sepang and went to the front section of KLIA runway. This was that highly restricted and dangerous area I was talking about!

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To get to the other side of the runway, we had to dangerously leap across the drain. No one was allowed to enter this zone, as anyone who does would be deemed a trespasser.

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But with permission from MAS, we had access to this area. Whee! Most of our initial shots were either horridly exposed and we had trouble with getting our desired shots as the weather was too hazy and cloudy with extremely random sunny spots in the sky.

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Very dull sky

Don’t mess with Mother Nature, she gets cranky at times! Ohwell, if ya can’t get shots of flying planes… shall we settle with flying birds instead?

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I guess not. Let’s try again!

With a telephoto lens, I was able to get myself a handful of shots that I was pretty pleased with. The rest were – sadly – destroyed shots, exposures gone wrong! It was indeed a challenge for all of us, to shoot fast-moving planes taking off and those in the sky more than 200m away in this temperamental weather.

Check out the planes taking off from the runway –

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Cathay Pacific Airlines from Hong Kong

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Indian Airlines departing

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and 3.. 2.. 1.
WE’RE ON AIR!

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A captivated Esther & Jon
During this MAS Plane Spotting session, we were able to not only check out MAS Aeroplanes, but other airlines as well.

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Apologies, my shot of the FedEx plane really did not do. Anyway, here are some of my successful shots of the other soaring planes :

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GMG Airlines from Bangladesh

airasia
If you’re Malaysian, I’ll slap you if you don’t recognize this
Air Asia!

beyondindia
Indian Airlines from duh, India

It was nice of Jon, Esther, Salina and the rest to bring some snacks and water for us!

goodies

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Stuffing our fat faces with ze muffin

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Aaron & I

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ChickenWings, Jason & I

Oh and thanks to Seet, each of us had a Polaroid shot for ourselves! Shake it like a Polaroid picha yo.

polaroid

But there’s nothing like a Nikon shot.
Wanna see some proud Nikonians?

nikonians
Bah, I’d better run for cover before the Canon,
Sony and Panasonic users skin me alive.


This whole experience made me somewhat more intrigued with planes and its aerodynamics. There must be very creative craftsmanship of a plane for it to lift itself thousands of meters above sea level!

pinnacle

All these planes in the 21st century have certainly gone a looooong way since creation of the 1st plane by the Wright brothers.

Imma share with you some useful information I’ve looked up :

lesson1

MAS plane was slightly nearer for me to get a closer shot
And coincidentally managed to shoot its rear end as well!

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I’m proud of our national airlines – aren’t you?
MAS rocks! It was a brilliant idea of having this whole event

thanks

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