Sorry for the long wait, guys! This page is kinda big though, so it might take a while to fully load. Before you take a look at them I must say I wish I had taken a better camera with me.. something like a CANON EOS 300D!!! oh well, I guess this will do
I returned the camera to my grandpa, so I couldn't take any screenshots of the movie I made
A view of BFA's EFIS screens.. still on the ground as you can see, with tons of EICAS messages displayed on the primary EICAS screen. ALT is set to FL060, A/T is set to 200 IAS and HDG is set to 239. We won't use 200 IAS and HDG 239 at all, but I'll explain that later.
The Boeing 747-400 has an observer seat, which is used by trainees (Second Officers) and a jump seat. The jump seat is located behind the captain and gives you a clear view of his primary EIFS displays.
The observer seat gives you a clear view of
EVERYTHING, though you need to adjust the seat slightly to do so. On the right a radio panel is located through which the observer can listen to ATC. You can zap through the active COMMs and on-board frequencies (purser etc) with this radio panel... I was constantly pressing the buttons on it, gave me a statisfying feeling :]
What you can see here is a clear view of the taxiway from the observer seat, behind the f/o. I can't remember this taxiway's name, but it runs parallel to rwy 36C.
Now what you see here is at our first cruise alt, flight level three three zero. My uncle, on the left, is reading "de Telegraaf", a dutch newspaper, while first officer Romeo Stienstra is enjoying the view (which is.. clouds, blue water and a blue sky). In the meanwhile, as we were doing absolutly nothing (okay we were discussing who would win Idols
, the aircraft slowly follows the magenta line as seen on the ND.
However, it was a 8,5 hour flight, and filling 8,5 hours discussing Idols and reading newspapers gets boring. So I kinda went out to explore the office area (which is HUGE for an aircraft). This is the emergency escape hatch. You have to pull this pillow-like thing off in order to open the hatch. On the other side of the cabin (which I've filmed but forgot to take a screenshot of
) there are so called escape reels. You better want to hold on to an escape reel, because it's a looooong way down if you're in an emergency
There is a total of 6 escape reels.
Okay, I might not have had the best camera with me but this is REALLY embarrassing. okay, it's the throttle quadrant but I uh.. well it looks like we're making a turn over right, but I'm actually just a bad photographer
I think I took this pic while we were still climbing, as the altimeter shows less than the 33000 ft we needed at the moment.
Okay here's a very cool view of the backup instruments
in case of a power failure, which will only occur when ALL four engines have stopped working, the backup instruments will be active for another 30 minutes. You won't need more than 30 minutes if your engines have failed, though..... :8
A nice view of the captain's EFIS displays when he went to the lavatory.
Okay now this is a VERY sexy view of the Navigation Display. I will now also explain why we didn't use the HDG and IAS.
Okay here goes! It's very simple, actually. At the beginning of the flight, the aircraft calculates the weight of the aircraft (fuel + passengers + cargo). This is done by the FMC, the two green screens next to the lower EICAS screen. Okay, with this info, the aircraft calculates the flap setting and the VR (rotation) speed. The only thing the pilot has to do is input the
waypoints. Waypoints have names over land (like SUGOL, ARTIP, VOMET etc.) but are coordinates over sea (you can see the coordinates on the ND, for example
N16W050 (a point we just passed)). If you put in all the waypoints, the FMC displays a magenta line on the ND, which the aircraft will follow when LNAV is activated. The FMC controls the throttle and heading, but not the altitude. The reason for this is that you have to ask a new flight level from ATC. Once you're cleared, you may climb. The FMC says what the most efficient height is, which depends on your weight. So the more fuel you loose, the higher you are allowed to fly. At the end of our flight our flight level was 390, while we started out at 330. So what we're doing at flight sim is kinda unprofessional... there is an LNAV option in flight sim, but it doesn't control the speed for you. In FS we use "manual" autothrottle, in real the FMC takes care of it
By the way, are you wondering what those green circles are??? Nothing, actually.. the f/o just likes to draw circles with the FMC :]
While f/o Romeo was showing us something on his laptop I got a clear view of the f/o's instruments, as seen above.
This is what Bravo Fox Alpha looks like from the outside
Here she is again!!! KLM's first 747-400, called Atlanta because she's number A in the BF registration series.
This has got to be the most romantic sunrise I've ever seen :p I've always been interested by sunrise and sunset, but seeing it from a Boeing 744 flight deck at FL390 is simply amazing! This was on my way back from PBM to AMS with captain Goede and f/o.. uh Anthony (can't remember his last name
.. and Anthony became 40 on this very flight! But we had no bday cake
The flight deck of BFB "Bankok" somewhere over Land's End, south England. El capitain shielded himself from the blinding sun with a neat vizor.
A somewhat better view of the throttle quadrant... This was kind of a stressing moment. We recieved an ACARS fax from Schiphol that our landing runway was 27. So the captain set the route for 27 in the FMC.. everything had to be gathered, ILS frequency etc etc.. but guess what happens. As soon as we start the descent (which started out with a descent rate of
4850 feet per minute 
) the controller clears us for 18R. But not to worry, we got to make a lot of 360's before we actually began the landing cycle (becuase of large amounts of inbound traffic at AMS). In fact it was so crouded we were number 7 on our way to rwy 18R.. and that was ONLY runway 18R, 18C was in full use too, we landed simultaniously with an easyJet 737-700.
Okay, this is a nice shot of the overhead panel.. my favorite shot yet, with the sun glare effects.
This was the most impressive landing I've every experienced! Not only did we dive into the clouds along with a B737 a few hundred meters left of us, we didn't have visual of the rwy until shortly before the GPWS called out "minimums". As soon as we got out of the clouds, the plane was shaking like mad. It felt like the wind pushed us up but the aircraft managed to compensate that. We touched down safely on 18R. Surprisingly, with all those winds we didn't have to use the rudder much to line up with the runway... I guess the wind was directly ahead of us
We used APR, but not for long. After the Landing Checklist was completed it was Autopilot Disengage (that button's HUGE, you won't miss it in a crowd) and manual all the way down.
And now for the moment we've all been waiting for.. ME!!!! Yeah yeah I know.. I just woke up (I slept in the cockpit crew rest cabin for an hour or 2) so I look totally messed up here
Well that's it... I'll bring a better camera along next time... not a video camera that makes JPG photos, but a still camera that makes MPEG movies
*looks at EOS 300D* :%
