Originally Posted by
JoeDTW
OK, this is my first posting to this thread, so please go easy on me!
Welcome here
4. During the 1970s and 1980s, this was the only Eastern Bloc airline to operate flights to Tel Aviv, Israel.
Tarom of Romania. El Al also operated into Bucharest in return as well.
16. Air France was the launch customer of the A300. What was the second airline to fly the A300?
I'll offer an obscure Thailand carrier called Varan Air Siam. Airbus were desperate for orders for the first A300s, and did a lease deal for one aircraft with this carrier, they got it a few months after the first Air France one was delivered, in 1974. They went out of business about 12 months later, and Airbus got the aircraft back.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:A..._Volpati-2.jpg
The third operator was also small-scale, TEA, a holiday airline based in Brussels, Belgium, got one of the shorter-fuselage A300 prototypes (not to be confused with the A310) shortly after Varan Air Siam. In their case, they flew it for around 20 years, there was of course no resale value for such a one-off, until it was finally retired.