Italy, Pisa airport plus overflights
Jan 19, 2023 9:56:43 GMT
davidallum, Trevor B, and 3 more like this
Post by graham on Jan 19, 2023 9:56:43 GMT
The company I joined in October 2017 was bought by an Italian paper manufacturer in March 2021. Every year they have what they call their "Beginning of Year" meeting where all of their European operations meet under one roof. This includes Poland, Hungary, France, Spain, Germany, Italy and now the UK.
The meeting location was Lucca in Tuscany, northern Italy which is close to their main Italian production plant about 15 miles away in a small town called Diecemo.
I flew out last Sunday afternoon from Stansted via Ryanair on EI-ENK. I'd chosen a seat in row with an emergency exit so had loads of extra room to stretch my legs on the 2hr 10min flight. Despite a 30 minute departure delay we arrived at Pisa bang on time but in darkness so there was nothing to see other than more Ryanairs and a parked up Challenger as we taxied to the terminal. The airport wasn't at all busy and all entry formalities and baggage claim were conducted inside of twenty minutes after which myself and our UK party of nine boarded the laid on minibus to take us to the rather swanky Guinigi Hotel situated on Via Romano about a mile from Lucca centre.
I did manage to see the Italian AF PD808 on its pole in the middle of a roundabout courtesy of the local street lamps but that was all I saw and potted on that first day.
The weather was clear with wispy cloud and mainly blue skies for the four days, daytime temperature around 12-14c, no lower than 8-9C overnight, everything was trailing and I managed to pot a few by way of the VRs. There was lots of north/south/north traffic no doubt heading for Rome and beyond into southern Europe but this was mainly 9H- registered Wizz Air Maltas and 9H- Malta Airs although the occasional HA-Wizz went across as did various other airlines.
There was a fair bit of helicopter activity and I saw three Italian Fire Service A139s over the four days. I also saw all four of ITA's A220s which seemed to ply the north/south routes to/from Rome several times a day.
During the afternoon of Monday we were transferred by coach to a restaurant to the SE of Lucca which saw us drive past the airfield at Tassignano where there were several GA parked up but nothing that could be read off due to distance and the speed of the coach.
We flew home from Pisa yesterday on the 14.05 local time Ryanair service to Stansted aboard 9H-QAL. After a colossal and extraordinarily noisy rain/sleet/hail/thunder/lightning storm, the skies cleared and as we taxied out, again a fashionable 30 minutes late, we passed several C130s and C27s as well some preserved stuff which Bill and Jeff have kindly ID'd for me.
An uneventful ride back to Stansted where again, we made up for the late departure and landed five minutes early. The airport was very quiet and again, we were very lucky with formalities and my case was third on the belt. Three hours to get home on very congested M11/M25/M4 but at least things kept moving and there was no snow/ice/fog to contend with.
I haven't logged what was seen yet, that's the next job after which I will post it here.
The meeting location was Lucca in Tuscany, northern Italy which is close to their main Italian production plant about 15 miles away in a small town called Diecemo.
I flew out last Sunday afternoon from Stansted via Ryanair on EI-ENK. I'd chosen a seat in row with an emergency exit so had loads of extra room to stretch my legs on the 2hr 10min flight. Despite a 30 minute departure delay we arrived at Pisa bang on time but in darkness so there was nothing to see other than more Ryanairs and a parked up Challenger as we taxied to the terminal. The airport wasn't at all busy and all entry formalities and baggage claim were conducted inside of twenty minutes after which myself and our UK party of nine boarded the laid on minibus to take us to the rather swanky Guinigi Hotel situated on Via Romano about a mile from Lucca centre.
I did manage to see the Italian AF PD808 on its pole in the middle of a roundabout courtesy of the local street lamps but that was all I saw and potted on that first day.
The weather was clear with wispy cloud and mainly blue skies for the four days, daytime temperature around 12-14c, no lower than 8-9C overnight, everything was trailing and I managed to pot a few by way of the VRs. There was lots of north/south/north traffic no doubt heading for Rome and beyond into southern Europe but this was mainly 9H- registered Wizz Air Maltas and 9H- Malta Airs although the occasional HA-Wizz went across as did various other airlines.
There was a fair bit of helicopter activity and I saw three Italian Fire Service A139s over the four days. I also saw all four of ITA's A220s which seemed to ply the north/south routes to/from Rome several times a day.
During the afternoon of Monday we were transferred by coach to a restaurant to the SE of Lucca which saw us drive past the airfield at Tassignano where there were several GA parked up but nothing that could be read off due to distance and the speed of the coach.
We flew home from Pisa yesterday on the 14.05 local time Ryanair service to Stansted aboard 9H-QAL. After a colossal and extraordinarily noisy rain/sleet/hail/thunder/lightning storm, the skies cleared and as we taxied out, again a fashionable 30 minutes late, we passed several C130s and C27s as well some preserved stuff which Bill and Jeff have kindly ID'd for me.
An uneventful ride back to Stansted where again, we made up for the late departure and landed five minutes early. The airport was very quiet and again, we were very lucky with formalities and my case was third on the belt. Three hours to get home on very congested M11/M25/M4 but at least things kept moving and there was no snow/ice/fog to contend with.
I haven't logged what was seen yet, that's the next job after which I will post it here.
