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This is how it feels to see 600 tons of aluminum flying a few meters over your head. I used a 17mm wide angle lens and even then I almost didn’t get the shot.

I was initially planning to stay on the viaduct that goes over Highway 13 but the thought of spending an hour in the wind with trucks passing right behind me was not really appealing. In addition we couldn’t see the approach so I was afraid that I’d miss it. Ultimately, Christiane and I decided to get right in the middle of things and we walked to the end of Pittfield Ave.

A few landings provided me with the opportunity to do some test shots, including a great image of an Air Canada A330. Ultimately these didn’t really prepare me for the real thing. Following a leisurely stroll around the island, the A380 finally settled into a final approach that seemed to take forever. That was just a size-induced illusion as it got in much faster than I anticipated. I got my approach shot, turned around, got down on one knee and barely had enough time to capture it going over the silhouettes of the other plane spotters.

If you send your images to Flickr, tag them with Montreal and A380 ^[2].