Night landing at LAX sped up to Mach 1.5

Spocko sez, "If you have ever flown into Los Angeles at night you know how beautiful it can be. This video is of a landing at LAX International Airport via the SADDE Six Arrival. The song is 'Los Angeles' by Sugarcult. The real time video was sped up to somewhere between Mach 1 and Mach 2."

City of Lights indeed!

HD Twilight Landing At LAX (Cockpit View)

I write books. My latest is a YA science fiction novel called Homeland (it's the sequel to Little Brother). More books: Rapture of the Nerds (a novel, with Charlie Stross); With a Little Help (short stories); and The Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow (novella and nonfic). I speak all over the place and I tweet and tumble, too.

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erg79

I love flying into LAX, especially at night. It’s so awesome to see places I only ever see on the ground from up above. Plus, it’s home.
erg79

I love flying into LAX, especially at night. It’s so awesome to see places I only ever see on the ground from up above. Plus, it’s always nice to come back home.
boingaddict

I watched this video to the tune of new Astrix……boy was that ever a trip…combined with being at work since 6 and 2 cups of coffee……now that’s what i call a friday hehe
- Anonymous
  
  How is it that the sun is setting while on final approach headed southwest and yet the video states it was takn in the morning??
Anonymous

Paris is the city of lights, not LA.
acb

The band sounds like an even more plastic version of The Killers. It really sounds like they’ve refined the production of angular, skinny-jeaned indie-rock cool to a list of simple instructions.
- Gilbert Wham
  
  From about 1:15 on here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hGbAsxAHCI4, and mute that wretched noise that comes attached to the clip.
  
  You’re welcome.
Jake0748

Wow, that was a bit scary, I couldn’t spot the runway until about 2 seconds before touchdown. That pilot got skilz. :)
febryle

Wow, what a great video. I’ve flown into LAX dozens of times and never come from the North along the coast.

For those wondering what SADDE Six Arrival is:
http://www.airliners.net/aviation-forums/tech_ops/read.main/27527/
MadRat

Reminds me of the time I had to fly from Anchorage to Portland through Los Angeles. Hey, don’t look at me, it was the airline’s idea. That was the least comfortable flight I’ve ever been on!
trieste

Great video. It really is a City of Tiny Lights.
Sparrow

The runway is easy to spot. Just look for the only place that isn’t as brightly lit up.
boingaddict

i wonder what would happened if these two were the pilots of the plane: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yQIBVQQEN0k
quesarah

Purty. This has been all over aviation forums last week.
It’s the “Palmdale transition”, PMD.SADDE6

http://204.108.4.16/d-tpp/1101/00237SADDE.PDF
( this link will expire within 56 days )

I was most impressed by how well whatever camera it was captured night lights. I’ve tried and failed to get images at night – you need a way better camera than I have.
Anonymous

Nice find! Knowing the area, you could see Hollywood clearly too. The sirens over Watts were a funny touch.
Anonymous

I miss Night Flight.
Michael

Damn, acb, I was just going to enthuse about the music.
- spocko
  
  Well since I’m the one who submitted it, you can probably guess I too like the music. Musical tastes are funny. I still remember my brother telling me that his musical tastes are “clearly superior” to mine.
  
  Personally I think the music enhanced the viewing experience.
  
  When I submit to Boing Boing I try and keep in mind the motto of the site about a place for “wonderful things” I thought this was wonderful and Cory agreed.
  
  There is so much pain and sorry in the world today, I like the way that the creator combined the music and video to make it something that could lift me out of myself into another space for a few minutes.
scifijazznik

I think this effect is achieved by moving the camera 10X slower than you think you need to.
Logicalnot

Few LA people know you can actually stand right under the airplanes path, just when they are about to land. And it’s safe.

Check @ 2:35, the last road is Sepulveda. And there is an In N Out burger just next to it!

So when my boys beg for a burger and I am too lazy to cook something healthy, we go there, grab a double double and a shake and eat that junk on the grass across the street.

At some point, we cross another little street and stand JUST UNDER the path, on the side walk. ABSOLUTE FUN!

Here is the location of the best In N Out burger of LA:
http://tinyurl.com/4ano29w
rulesaremyenemy

Every time I fly into LAX I am reminded of the opening to Blade Runner: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AbWNZkoQHuE

(I tried to sync these clips up with youtube doubler but embedding is disabled on the Blade Runner video)
dunkyboy

pretty colours! whenever I’m on a plane at night I think of this clip…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P1ha3lPXy0s
Anonymous

There is what looks like a reflection of the city lights on what might be the nose of the plane, however, I don’t see how the city lights, which are below the plane, would end up reflected on the upper surface of the plane’s nose, which is facing upwards and so should not have the city lights reflecting on it. Maybe it has to do with the curvature of the nose and the angle of the camera?
Chloramphenicol

Blade Runner = yes. Though I also can’t help but think that the city looks an awful lot like a PCB as well, or at least what I imagine a PCB would look like if you could see the individual electrons / bits…
Anonymous

I wanna be a jet pilot!
Haakon IV

If you have ever flown into Los Angeles at night you know how beautiful it can be.

I’ve always seen it as depressingly endless sprawl when I’ve flown into LAX. The beauty of flying over California generally increases away from L.A.

Not to say that this video isn’t cool. It is.
Logicalnot

Few LA people know you can actually stand right under the airplanes when it is just about to land. And it’s safe.

Check @ 2:35, the last road is Sepulveda. And there is an In N Out burger just next to it!

So when my boys beg for a burger and I am too lazy to cook something healthy, we go there, grab a double double and a shake and eat that junk on the grass across the street.

At some point, we cross another little street and stand JUST UNDER the path, on the side walk. ABSOLUTE FUN!

Here is the location of the best In N Out burger of LA:
http://tinyurl.com/4ano29w
zuben

Is there an equivalent unicorn chaser for awful muzak?
Jack

Has BoingBoing posted this set of photos from Vanity Fairâ€™s look at the work of Dennis Muren? Check out the E.T. photo with the matte painting of L.A. I find it fascinating that whole scene was basically in miniature:
http://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/features/2010/11/industrial-light-and-magic-201011?currentPage=all
Crashproof

Nice. Suck it, Tron Legacy!
Teller

The City of Headlights.
hectorinwa

Funny, I signed in mostly to poke at the bad music.

Pretty nutty how camouflaged the runway is in there.
Maddy

I thought all electronic devices were supposed to be turned off
wgmleslie

So much for noise abatement!
tomrigid

A unique and beautiful city. Not the healthiest or most sustainable, but amazing in its way. Thanks.
El Stinko

Wow, the Onion just reported on the same event… http://www.theonion.com/articles/study-90-of-plane-landings-just-barely-pulled-off,19012/
Merlin Silk

This sure is beautiful and I experienced it often in my little Piper Warrior. I often took friends on a night tour over LA – Take-off Burbank going east, then down the LA river to Long Beach, turn right, through the LAX special flight rule corridor right over the center of LAX to Santa Monica and then North, back to Burbank – 45 minutes of SoCal light show.
Cory, I once offered you to take you along – at your yard sale when leaving LA – but you never took me up on that, and now it’s too late, don’t have my little Warrior any more :-(
Anonymous

Another example of the many things that look so much better from a distance.
killer turnip

Having only watched Tron Legacy recently, I was struck at how the grid layout of LA streets reminded me of the city grid in the movie. I thought it might be fun to do a Tron treatment to the original source video.

http://bit.ly/eRvKPo
kpkpkp

It takes longer to taxi from the runway to the gate than it takes to fly from Thousand Oaks to the runway
Big_Dig

Don’t let ‘em get you down, spocko, there’s no accounting for taste or the need to express it negatively. But for those who won’t give the video a look because of the “terrible” music or “offensive” lyrics, try playing it to The Fall’s “L.A.” The timescales even match up nearly perfectly. Here’s a high-quality version:

http://bit.ly/XaB1B
uvulaflavor

You lost me at “I want a girl that won’t talk back.”