Christchurch Airport opens spotters' park to view first A380 arrival
Roads normally used by plane spotters will be closed on October 31.
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Infrastructure
Christchurch Airport is closing roads and opening up a Plane Spotters’ Park plane-spotters in a week today, October 31, to cope with large crowds expected to view the arrival of first Airbus A380 superjumbo (see map below).
The Emirates flight from Sydney will land at about 1.45pm and the park will be open only in an area on the other side of the runway from the terminal.
Meanwhile, roads near the terminal that usually attract plane spotters will be closed to make easier handling of the extra expected traffic.
The park will be open from 11am and close after the aircraft departs for Sydney at 6.45pm.
Emirates is upgrading the service to a one-stop flight to Dubai via Sydney and is dropping the Bangkok stopover. Instead, Emirates will add Bangkok to one of its four daily services from Auckland to Dubai.
Christchurch Airport chief aeronautical and commercial officer Justin Watson says the spotters’ park will offer hundreds of people the chance to park up to witness, film and photograph the world’s largest passenger jet.
“We are very aware of aviation enthusiasts’ excitement at this spectacular aircraft flying in here today and every day afterward,” he says.
“The viewing area will be accessed from Pound Rd and we’ll have traffic management signs and staff on the roads leading to it, to assist everyone to get to the area safely.”
The new A380 service will cut two hours off the normal flying time on the existing Christchurch-Sydney-Bangkok-Dubai route.
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Nevil Gibson
Mon, 24 Oct 2016
Mon, 24 Oct 2016
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Christchurch Airport opens spotters' park to view first A380 arrival
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