Long Haul Pilot Captures Night Flight in Timelapse

Night Photography  •  Photography Tips  •  Time-lapse Photography

More so than most people, Sales Wick keeps his eyes in the sky. That’s because, aside from being one part of a Zurich based film agency, he’s an experienced airline pilot. Whether he’s flying a drone or a commercial jet, the majority of his work is produced high above the Earth’s surface:

In this recent piece combining Wick’s passion for aviation and imagery, he records a late night flight over the Atlantic Ocean. As the vessel heads westward, the darkness drags on and on. With an empty, lightless ocean below, the scattered stars illuminate the Milky Way.

Hundreds of shooting stars spiral through the scene, and wisps of blues and purples create a feeling more akin to traveling through hyperspace than performing a routine red-eye flight. While there’s plenty on the surface for us to admire, the team behind SkyProduction reminds us that there’s always something breathtaking hanging just above our heads.

“Just as the bright city lights are vanishing behind us, the Milky way starts to become clearly visible up ahead. [It’s] now us, pacing at almost the speed of sound along the invisible highway and the pitch-black night sky above this surreal landscape. Ahead of us are another eight hours flight time, but we already stopped counting the shooting stars. And we got already to a few hundred.”