What's with the white nose on N744P ?

[LGA777]

As a few of you may have noticed the Piedmont Retro Scheme A-319, N744P has been flying around for about 10 days with a white nose/radome !

http://www.jetphotos.net/viewphoto.php?id=5837926

I would imagine the original nose was damaged ? Anyone in MTC or eslewhere know if this is going to be corrected ? The same thing happened with the PSA bird, N742PS for about 2 weeks or so recently but now it has been corrected.

Thanks in advance for intelligent replies related to the above subject.

Regards

LGA777

 

[CLT-Douglas]

I saw this plane pull up to a gate that I just so happened to be sitting by a window at and the nose had a bunch of black marks and scratches on it. Maybe they are repainting it? The PSA bird also has the same symptoms the last I saw of it.

 

[Phantom Fixer]

Mis-Matched Radomes and engine cowlings and even flight control surfaces take place all the time...it just tends to be more apparent on the Hybrid paint schemes.

Radomes get damaged by bird strikes , lightning strikes , delamination of the composite materials and errosion all the time. Hinge point hardware also breaks from time to time.

U keeps a small inventory of radomes within the system that cater to the Old U Blue scheme..The star alliance livery...and the New U scheme. A fourth variant for the Airbus family called the Weather-Master is also kept in inventory thats the eldest type of the lot.

Costs dictate having ready-made matching replacements for the heritage planes impossible. Rest assured...the old radome for the PI plane will be repaired in due course...and then returned to the aircraft.

 

[320tech]

[/quote]
you should see all the west a/c flying around with green cowling on the new paint and blue cowls on the old paint.

 

[732guy]

Mis-Matched Radomes and engine cowlings and even flight control surfaces take place all the time...it just tends to be more apparent on the Hybrid paint schemes.

Everyone at HP thought they were so ingenious in devising the new paint scheme and was touted as being part-replaceable friendly so that we wouldn't be flying mis-matched planes around. Guess those PHX minds don't think of everything.

 

[LGA777]

Thanks for the replies guys, saw her last night still with the white nose. Here is another photo of her with the white nose!

http://www.jetphotos.net/viewphoto.php?id=...92;\\

Regards

LGA777