Tarbes Airport is at the foot of the Pyrenees, not far from Airbus headquarters Toulouse, and although few people in the country have heard of it, it is indeed one of the world's most famous aircraft cemeteries.
It's a "hub" for decommissioned Airbus planes or planes that haven't found a place to go, where they are stored and awaiting resale or dismantling.
The three images above show several A350-900s painted by HNA.
On Airbus' order, seven A350-900s have yet to be delivered to Hainan Airlines, five of which already have fuselage numbers, including B-308G, B-308H, B-308J, B-30DP and B-30DM.
And HNA's current situation and the current situation of domestic civil aviation, I don't know if these A350-900s have the opportunity to fly to the beautiful Hainan Island to feel the slight sea breeze.
The three photos above are air France and Etihad Airways A380, or the City of London paint, and the Shenzhen Airlines B737-900 (B-5106) that has just arrived in Tarbes.
Etihad Airways has procured a total of 10 A380s, making it the 13th airline in the world to own an A380. What many people don't know is that Etihad Airways is the real flag-carrying airline in the UAE compared to Emirates, which is famous for its trenches.
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Etihad Airways' A380s are almost entirely in storage. Although Etihad Airways has planned to retire all the A380s in its fleet, with the A35K and B777-9X baton, considering that the oldest of its A380 fleets is less than 6 years old, the youngest is even only 5 years old, and half of the time is in storage, if the civil aviation industry recovers in the future, it is not impossible to return to the blue sky.
Shenzhen Airlines introduced six B737-900s in 2005. On June 13, 2005, a new B737-900 arrived at Shenzhen Airport, making Shenzhen Airlines the launch user of the B737-900 in China. Of course, it is also the only user of B737-900 in China, and the B737-900ER introduced by Oake.
The B-5106 was the first aircraft delivered directly by Boeing to Shenzhen Airlines, named "Beijing", and was a frequent flyer on the Beijing-Shenzhen route.
On December 16, 2015, when the plane was executing the ZH9753 Shenzhen-Hangzhou flight, it was also on the hot search due to a tire burst to prepare for Hongqiao.
Deputy Director Li Jian, who is supporting important tasks in Hangzhou, instructed the crew to go to Shanghai Hongqiao diversion to ensure the implementation of important tasks at Hangzhou Airport.
On April 27, 2022, the B-5106, as the last aircraft in Shenzhen Airlines' B737-900 fleet, was decommissioned and flew to Seoul, and then flew to Tabu via Bishkek and Burgas to be sealed, waiting for the next buyer.
Irresponsible speculation, it feels that the next buyer of this batch of B737-900 of Shenzhen Airlines is likely to be a "professional second-hand guy" Delta Air Lines.
The above three pictures are the fourth MSN004 of the airbus A350 prototype, the former fuselage originally had the livery of the starter Qatar Airways, I don't know if it was later repainted with large white paint, or whether Airbus and Qatar Airways shoveled it after a fight.
The A350 has five prototypes, and the numbering of these five aircraft is not in the order of the first flight (again a little bit of cold knowledge).
The MSN001 first flew on June 14, 2013, and mainly undertook the basic maneuverability test flight, flight envelope test flight, key system test and other tasks.
The MSN003 first flew on October 14, 2013 and conducted extreme cold environment tests, hot weather tests, etc.
MSN003 flew to Iquit, Canada for extreme cold environment testing
Canada's Iqlat has the most suitable conditions in the world to complete the extreme cold environment test of aircraft, ARJ21 spent many years in China failed to find suitable test conditions and environment, and finally went to Canada to solve.
The MSN002 and MSN004 made their first flights simultaneously on February 26, 2014.
MsN002 is painted with "carbon fiber" and equipped with a complete cabin for testing and validating all systems related to cabins and passengers, and conducting long-range flight tests, etc.;
The MSN004 section depicts the starter Qatar Airways livery to highlight Qatar Airways' importance as the launch user of the A350XWB.
The aircraft is equipped with light flight test equipment, mainly responsible for light weight flight envelope certification and external noise testing, lighting testing, etc., and is used to start the pilot and aircraft maintenance training of customer Kahang.
But who can think that Airbus and Kahang, who had such a good relationship at that time, are now because of the A350's paint loss problem, and finally make a lot of trouble, and Airbus even does not hesitate to use the initiative to "cut orders" super big move.
I can only sigh: it seems that nothing is eternal and unchanging, and the only constant is that the world has been changing.
The MSN005 first flew on June 20, 2014, as the second A350XWB test aircraft after the MSN002 to be equipped with a full cabin, and was mainly used for final forensic work such as route verification flight and extended range operation (ETOPS) verification.
There are many planes in the aircraft graveyard, but their stories are more.