In the hours since posting these questions yesterday, a pleasant BAe146/RJ has brought me 300 miles westward to Dublin, departing London City in an absolute monsoon (as we waited at the gate the others were fascinated by seeing the water clouds blown up behind jets departing in such conditions) to Ireland, where in a reversal of the weather stereotype it's a pleasant summer day. Good for Cityjet, who have been a bit financially challenged in recent times, and reducing routes, that every seat was taken, first time I can recall that on the route. And a nice UK-built aircraft, not quite the last of production but towards the end.
Originally Posted by
jrl767
these are the only two that I think I have a reasonable shot at guessing:
I joined Boeing in Jul 1978, which I'm pretty sure was not long after the last delivery of a 707 to a commercial customer; it seems to me that it was a -300C that went to an African carrier ... I want to say Royal Air Maroc, but I may have that confused with the 707-700 flight test jet with CFM56 engines (I actually logged a handful of flights on N707QT as a test engineer; the jet was ultimately restored to -300 configuration and delivered to the Govt of Morocco) ... how about Sudan Airways?
I started work at Edwards AFB in the summer of 1984, when the last few L-1011-500s were still on the ramp at Lockheed's Palmdale facility (along with N1011, the #1 jet) ... I recall several dark-grey or black tails which were most likely Alia Royal Jordanian aircraft, and if I had to guess I'd say N1011 was there by its lonesome early the following year
Very good shots,
jrl. In my records the last 707 was indeed a 320C to an African airline, although not Sudan. It was delivered in 1978. Just 11 years old, it went to an overhaul contractor in Dublin in 1989 for a D-check, that the carrier then didn't have funds to pay for the interim payments, so it sat there half-done with no engines for years afterwards and in the end was scrapped. Rather a short life. This wasn't the only time such happened with this airline, a widebody overhaul at Amsterdam in later years went the same way.
Regarding the Tristars, the Alia aircraft were indeed towards the end of production, and seem to have been delivered throughout 1983, but there was one more went to an airline at the start of 1984. It probably turned up in The Americas most days thereafter.
Were the Alia aircraft actually still at Palmdale in 1984 ? Most of their tails were red, although there does seem to have been one grey one