Originally Posted by
Adam Smith
Why exactly do you think AC should do this? You do know that all airliners have to have the ID painted on the fuselage near the rear door, right? As for the underwing being "industry standard", you say that EI has it, and based on looking at a few shots on Planespotters, so do WS and BA, but UA, AA and DL don't, nor does LH.
You will also find the airline's fin number on the tail and the nose wheel door.
I think it is just a matter of common sense that all airlines follow this practice and certainly common throughout most of the world, except possibly the US.
As to Planespotters, whatever that may be, I've never heard of them!
I have been on literally every Aer Lingus EI plane, right back to the old vintage DH84 Dragon EI-AFK, now EI-ABI, most recently a short hop on EI-DEN, and many many others. I do not need to go to picture sites such as airliner.net other than for research. But having been RTW a number of times and all over SE Asia on many 9Vs from DC3s to Comets, I have never once seen a civil airliner without an underside registration on the port wing.
Incidentally, regarding the nosewheel door identifier, you do know that's for the airline's own convenience. While AC uses the fin number such as 801 for GHPQ, other airlines such as Aer Lingus use a shortened version of the civil registration; EI-DEN being just DEN, while some countries abbreviate it to two letters.
I just feel that with the extent that AC serves the world having the under-wing registration included would be prudent step.