747-800

Tony Crake

I spot going over my house (January 2017), at 600mph plus,  2 of the "new" 747 800s.

Pretty rare and they are Lufthansa (sadly) … Frankfurt to Boston and NY.

Thanks to Radar 24 and good binoculars !

Dave Mundy

Does it look any different? I usually spot a Qantas A-380 as I pass LHR on the way to my Thursday pub. I always remember running out of the house when Concorde took off to the East and flew over Twickenham and Surbiton – I took a photo on its last ever passenger flight.

Tony Crake

The 747-8 is a bit of a mystery plane.. It was (according to Wiki) meant to be a simple upgrade using the Dreamliner technology. Took so long to debug, all those with loads of dosh had signed up for the 380 Airbus! The freight version, however, is selling well but few have opted for the passenger setup.

It’s longer than the original and longer than a 380…  and I’ve only seen these two through a pair of binos at 37,000 feet and the contrail was odd … looked like 3 engines! Concorde flypast at the Belfry in 1985 was just… fantastic!  Pilot nearly lost his license apparently…

Alec Bray

I was on a plane heading towards the South runway at LHR to take off (we were past Terminal One and waiting to turn 180 degrees right to take off to the West) on the day of the last flight of Concorde from LHR Friday, 24 October, 2003, 10:30 when G-BOAE was to take off on the internal flight to Edinburgh –  to return later that day as one of the three last Concorde arrivals.  

The captain of our aircraft said “Look to the Left: Concorde is waiting to take off.  Watch out for the noise!”  And so it proved to be! Concorde was on the North runway – a mile away – and even so the noise as its engines were opened up was astounding.

What a privilege to have seen a Concorde take off from LHR, and on what a day!

Some 5 or more years before that, myself and another person from our small company (“Network Managers Ltd”) had been invited out for a “jolly” by one of our business contacts.  This was to tour a Boeing 747 and a Concorde at LHR, via the Freight handling side of things.  So we went into a 747 cabin (which I had been in several times as a passenger to LA and NY) and into a Concorde cabin (which I had never been in): what A contrast!  I could hardly stand up in the Concorde.  But what a magnificent plane: it used to fly over our house on its way to New York, and it was the only plane that we – friends and neighbours – looked up to the sky to see as the big white bird flew overhead.