Beluga Watching at Chester Zoo
I took two lovely ladies, Mandy and Beryl, out on one of my 1 2 1 Photo Tuition sessions at Chester Zoo today. Fantastic weather, sunny but with a cool wind, perfect conditions to photograph the elephants, zebras, camels, warthogs, butterflies, chimps …. the list goes on. Superb animal sightings and both my ‘students’ got some great shots under their belts.
But the highlight for me was hearing an almighty roar overhead, looking up and seeing a Beluga!! No, not the beluga whale or white whale (Delphinapterus leucas) – the arctic cetacean – but the AIRBUS BELUGA aircraft, which was specially designed to transport Airbus parts between British Aerospace’s factory outside Chester and the European Airbus factories in Europe.
The aircraft has an extension on the fuselage top like the Beluga whale, thus the name. Some 56m in length, a 45m wingspan and a 47 ton payload capacity, some beast indeed.