Wait until you see the Airbus Beluga [1] or Boeing Dreamlifter [2]!
I recommend going to the Davis-Monthan Air Force Boneyard in Tucson, AZ [3] and the nearby Pima Air & Space Museum [4] to see all the other big baddies.
I live directly under the flight path for the Beluga's landing in the Hamburg airbus site, in a nice area north of the Elbe river.
One interesting thing about the Beluga: the pilots very often fail to land them and have to do multiple attempts! The Beluga landing is kind of loud, but it's nothing compared to the sound of the engines when they pull up after a failed attempt
> One interesting thing about the Beluga: the pilots very often fail to land them and have to do multiple attempts!
They're likely just doing a fly by for a visual inspection of the runway since it's not a major public airport with full time air traffic control.
Most people are smart enough not to park something in the middle of a runway but might not have an intuitive grasp of how large a wingspan these things have.
Most of the time they land the first time and you can tell they’re coming in too hot when it happens. It could also be when there are container ships crossing the Elbe that they’re scared they might hit
(They stopped at the onset of the pandemic and AFAIK never resumed.)
The museum is still well worth visiting, and driving around you can see some of the planes parked in the Boneyard. Davis-Monthan also puts on a pretty good airshow every couple years.
The same sorta happened to Paul Allen’s fighter plane museum in Washington. His sister manages his estate now, and has been ruthless at liquidating all the assets he collected for the public good. It’s infuriating.
I saw the Mriya landing in my city once. I was right bellow her when she was on the final approach, less than 50ft above my head. The experience was... humbling, to say the least.
I have been on two tours of the A380 final assembly building, the last time was with senior Airbus people so got basically the customer tour walking round the aircraft.
Have seen Belugas flying and on the ground at Toulouse.
Beluga isn't that special, if you live where they come and go daily, sometimes several times. Rather annoying, because loud. At least louder than an A380, which is really big, but not as loud.
One time I heard a different-sounding plane, I looked up, and it was one of them flying a different path than usual on their routine flights from Tolouse to Hamburg (Airbus sites), sadly it seems they haven't repeated that.
I recommend going to the Davis-Monthan Air Force Boneyard in Tucson, AZ [3] and the nearby Pima Air & Space Museum [4] to see all the other big baddies.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Airbus_Beluga
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_Dreamlifter
[3] https://www.airplaneboneyards.com/davis-monthan-afb-amarg-ai...
[4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pima_Air_%26_Space_Museum