T his is a photographic essay of a team of executives of Delta Air Lines called Exec Express, which was one of greater than 80 teams that pulled a Boeing 757-232 aircraft for the 2015 Jet Drag at the Technical Operations Center near the world headquarters of Delta Air Lines in order to raise funds for the American Cancer Society.
Although I was on one of the teams which pulled the aircraft — I will report on that in a future article — I was unable to take pictures with a camera while pulling an airplane weighing greater than 150,000 pounds with a thick rope; so I shot this series of photographs after the team on which I was a member had already pulled the airplane.
Members of teams queue inside one of the hangars of the Technical Operations Center of Delta Air Lines on a day where the weather was absolutely perfect.
The executives line up to get ready for the pull — and notice on what each person is standing…
…a Delta Air Lines “widget” painted on the ground, indicating where each team member should stand before going out to pull the airplane.
This is what awaits each team. Airplanes queue up in the background for their turn to take off from the runway.
The team — led by Bill Lentsch, who is the senior vice president of Airport Customer Service and Cargo Operations for Delta Air Lines — lines up at the rope, preparing to drag the behemoth. Good thing it was not an Airbus A380 aircraft filled with passengers.
The announcer of the event is the man in the striped shirt talking into the microphone.
Members of the executive team are the stars of the many photographers — professional and amateur — at this event. Meanwhile, the last person on the team has the end of the rope wrapped around him.
I suppose you might say that he is at the end of his rope. Anyway, the following series of photographs should be viewed as if you were watching stop-motion video.
As members of the next team — Team Engines Propulsion Pullers — await their turn, the official time is displayed: 11.801 seconds elapsed for the Exec Express team pulling the Boeing 757-232 aircraft.
Well done.
All photographs ©2015 by Brian Cohen.
