Tiger Face Jet Supports Endangered Big Cats

Transaero Airlines and the Amur Tiger Center have launched – literally – a joint project that saw the nose of a Boeing 747-400 painted in Amur Tiger livery.  Tiger Face Jet Supports Endangered Big Cats

Transaero Airlines has reached a number of milestones over its 25 year (as of December 2015) history. In addition to being Russia’s first privately-owned commercial air carrier, Transaero was also the first post-soviet carrier to institute a frequent flyer program and its varied fleet of Russian, European and American-built airliners numbers nearly 200. (images via Getty and Fedor Leukhin).

Tiger Face Jet Supports Endangered Big Cats

Transaero has also experimented with distinctive aircraft livery schemes in partnership with private and public groups. One of the most recent such liveries is also one of the most memorable: a Boeing 747-400 jet whose nose section was painted to resemble the head of a rare Amur Tiger, also known as the Siberian Tiger. (image via Fedor Leukhin)

Tiger Face Jet Supports Endangered Big Cats

The Amur Tiger Project is the world’s longest running radiotelemetry-based tiger research and conservation effort. In association with the WCS (Wildlife Conservation Society), the Amur Tiger Project monitors the roughly 350 adult Amur tigers who live in the wild. About 95% of these rare and majestic beasts roam the Sikhote-Alin Biosphere Reserve, located within the tigers’ traditional range but economic development in eastern Russia and neighboring northeastern China poses a renewed threat to wild tigers. (image via Nik Pilgrim)