To mark the start of international scheduled services this week by ANA’s Boeing 787, I thought I’d mention a few other places you’ll be seeing the type this year. We’ll see a lot more Boeing 787 Dreamliners in our skies this year as more are delivered to airlines such as Air India, Japan Airlines and China Southern, so it’s time to start getting them in your logbooks!

Tokyo Haneda & Narita
With both ANA and JAL operating the Dreamliner this year, one of the best places to catch the type is at their Tokyo Narita and Haneda bases. This seems likely to be the place to catch the biggest concentration of Dreamliners outside of Seattle or Charleston this year.

Frankfurt International
For Europe, Frankfurt is the first place to see 787 operations with ANA from Tokyo. This was the type’s first international destination, and will be flying in every day.

Seattle
OK, so there are a few Seattle airports to see Deamliners. Most notably, Boeing’s Everett facility is the place where they’re put together. So you’ll see them quite regularly on flight test and out on the flight line. This includes the demonstrators, which is quite cool. However, ANA have also announced 787 flights to Seattle-Tacoma Airport from Tokyo, starting soon.

Boston
The US East Coast gets its first Dreamliner service from Japan Airlines in April, with non-stop service to Tokyo Narita.

Singapore
From September, Japan Airlines’ flights from Tokyo Narita will switch to 787s, increasing to 14x weekly by the end of October.

Melbourne
From October, Air India is expected to begin sending its 787s to Melbourne from its Indian bases. This will likely mark the first scheduled Dreamliner services to Australia.

Osaka Itami
Again, ANA sends its 787s to Itami. Maybe we’ll see more routes out of Osaka’s Kansai airport in the future, but for now the domestic one is the place to be.

New Delhi
Japan Airlines will start daily 787 flights to Delhi from Tokyo Narita later this year. However, if Air India receive their 787s on time, the airport is likely to get even more of the type in residence.

Moscow Domodedovo
Japan Airlines will send their Dreamliners to Moscow DME this year, replacing their 777 equipment. This sees the second known destination in Europe for the type.

Guangzhou
Despite heavy delays, China Southern are expected to take delivery of their first 787 before the Autumn. Therefore their home base of Guangzhou will become a hub for the type very soon.

There are of course more airports that the 787 flies to, such as domestic destinations within Japan. And as new frames arrive for Air India and China Southern, new routes will be announced. If you hear of any, let me know.

Ryanair has announced its 50th base will be at Paphos in Cyprus.

I didn’t see that one coming, but the airport has lost a lot of routes from Cyprus Airways recently, so it probably makes sense.

The airline will base 2 Boeing 737-800s at Paphos from April, and routes will include:

Paphos – Chania
Paphos – Frankfurt Hahn
Paphos – Kaunas
Paphos – Krakow
Paphos – London
Paphos – Memmingen
Paphos – Milan
Paphos – Oslo
Paphos – Patras
Paphos – Pisa
Paphos – Rome
Paphos – Stockholm
Paphos – Thessaloniki
Paphos – Venice Treviso

London Southend Airport is really taking off. After years living in the shadows of London’s other airports, the once-popular airport is now on the way back up.

Although for many years it’s been a place to find mouth-wateringly rare aircraft in storage and between owners (which to some extent continues to this day), the airport finally has some scheduled routes to shout about, and a bunch of new infrastructure being built ready for this year’s London Olympic Games. Southend is one of the closest airports to the games, so I expect it will be pretty busy around that period.

Here’s an update on the airport’s growth and plans:

- Runway extension has now been built, with the taxiways all improved and new lighting added. Full runway will be in operation from March.

- Scheduled services to Ireland have started with Aer Arann.

- easyJet begin routes to 9 European destinations from April, with 3 based Airbus A319 aircraft.

- The new control tower and railway station (with fast links to London) have been opened.

- New terminal under construction, to be opened in February. Extended apron and stands almost complete.

- New Holiday Inn under construction at the airport.

I’ll be visiting this year to check out the new facilities and to see what the viewing situation is like with the new roads, runway, hotel and terminal. You may want to schedule a visit to Southend during the Olympics as I think it will get quite busy.

Why not send us a trip report if you use one of the new easyJet routes?

Fantastic news for those in the USA – ANA (All Nippon Airways) will start flying their Boeing 787 Dreamliners on scheduled services to the USA from April 2012.

The three routes announced are from Toyko Narita to San Jose, CA, Seattle, WA, and Washington DC Dulles.

Flights begin on 1 April 2012.

Great news for spotters over there, and I think this proves to some degree (San Jose) that the 787 will be used to try out more niche long haul routes.

As a side note, there will, however, be a delay to the planned Beijing and Frankfurt 787 services due to a delay in delivery of the third aircraft to ANA.

British Airways are eagerly awaiting delivery of their first Boeing 777-300 model, which has recently been snapped in the final assembly line at Boeing Field, Seattle.

The aircraft is due to enter service on 10th August 2010, with it fully featuring in the new Winter 2010/11 timetable. It will appear on the following routes:

London Heathrow – Chicago O’Hare BA296/297,  20 August-30 October
London Heathrow – Delhi BA256/257, 20 August-30 October
London Heathrow – Dubai BA106/107, 20 August-March 2011
London Heathrow – Mumbai BA138/139, 22 August-March 2011

The long-awaited news of the sale of London Gatwick Airport was announced today. BAA was told to sell the airport, and has now agreed a deal with Global Infrastructure Partners (GIP) for £1.5bn. GIP are also the majority owner of London City Airport.

The sale of the airport was ordered to counteract what was described as a lack of competition in the UK airports market, particularly in London where BAA held Gatwick, Heathrow and Stansted airports. This should bring much better choice and prices for passengers, with new airlines and routes likely to be announced.

The sale is still to be approved by the European Union – expected to be finalised in December.

For the enthusiast, the sale is likely to spice up the mix of operators flying into Gatwick, although details of this will only come as GIP take over and the new operation takes hold. It is highly unlikely we will see any official spotting locations return, but who knows?

The next new airline to operate the Airbus A380 after Singapore, Emirates and Qantas is Air France, who will start flights on 23 November with their first aircraft, F-HPJA. Another two will follow by Spring 2010.

The airline has announced the routes the aircraft will operate as:
Dubai (1 February 2010)
Johannesburg (early 2010)
New York JFK (23 November 2009)
Tokyo Narita (spring 2010)

All will operate from Paris CDG airport. Interestingly, the route to Dubai will start 15 days before Emirates start using A380s on their Dubai – Paris route.

The aircraft will visit Paris Orly on 11 November to test the airport as a diversion field from CDG.

The new high-speed train link from Amsterdam Schiphol is due to open in September. This will run directly from the terminal to Antwerp, Breda, Brussels and Rotterdam.

Trains running on the route travel at 250km/h 16 times a day. This makes travel around the Netherlands and Benelux region much faster.

I’ve been an avid fan of Johnny Jet’s weekly newsletter for quite a few years now. It always makes a fascinating read as he travels week-by-week around the globe, taking up frequent flier deals with airlines and hotels, and often trying out new services, routes and aircraft.

Whilst his reports are geared around travel, and the places he sees around the world, I thought I’d give it a mention here because he travels almost exclusively by air. Therefore in each of his weekly newsletters, you get an account of at least two airports, and an airline.

Whilst this doesn’t help you much with spotting aircraft, it will surely be useful in giving you an overview of the various airports he visits (he covers everything from how modern the terminal is, to the price of a bottle of water). i know a lot of you travel by air to spot at different airports.

He runs a large website known as Johnnyjet.com, and has his free newsletter which you can sign up to. I really recommend it!