V-Flyer

This article seems to be causing a bit of a hoo-har in the environmental world as well as over on a.net.

I am shocked that the US Authorities do not allow the fumigation procedures to take place in the US. Cananyone (Scrooge) enlighten us as to why? Surely at a time when the aviation industry is being hit hard, it seems crazy to make a carrier send a plane all the way to LHR to be fumigated. Having said that I do not undestand why DL do not do 'Top of Descent' fumigation as per many other major carriers.

Of course there is a bit of 'sexying up' on the part of the Guardain in all this. DL have been attempting to get the 77L put onto the ATL-LHR route when an aircraft needs fumigation in order to stop it being flown across the atlantic empty. Of course schedule restrictions do not allow this all the time. They have from I have seen on a.net, managed to this a couple of times.

The Guardian also fail to point out that the aircraft in question, is one of the most environmentally friendly planes in the skies and less than a year old.

I thought you meant Dragon Lady was doing ghost flights! [:0]

Where does United (American Carrier who fly to Australia) get their 747s done?

UA get's theirs done in Australia.

It's all down to the chemical that has to be used and the amount of time the aircraft has to sit empty.
If I am remembering correctly it's 6 hours, for UA that's not a problem as their aircraft sit's in Australia for around 8 hours, for DL it is a problem as their aircraft is there only 3 hours.

Meaning that once every couple of months it has to take a hop over to LHR to get sprayed.

The problem stems from the fact that the EPA has not ok'd the chemical for fumigating an aircraft, once that is done the ghost flights will stop.

quote:Originally posted by Scrooge


The problem stems from the fact that the EPA has not ok'd the chemical for fumigating an aircraft, once that is done the ghost flights will stop.


Apparently DL will be using downtime on China routes from next month