Finally a voice of reason.^

Nines
 

I love the old DC-9's for many reasons, yes they are old and have steam gauges but they beat the RJ's hands down.
The most fun in the series were the original DC-9-10's,not much bigger than an RJ themselves.Took off lightly loaded like a rocket and handled like a sports car.DL,EA they were a mainstay of the fleet for many years.
Nines were used on longer routes I have flown, by AC from TPA-YYZ and also a 50 series Northeast Yellowbird, TPA-BOS.Not bad at all and steak dinner too, but that was a few years back unlike today
Enjoyable, yes, unless you get the no window engine seats....still better than a RJ.
And don't tell the Nine haters, rumor has it (and it would be a good fit) that DL will take the 717's from Airtran parent WN when they want to dump them. 717's are Nines essentially with glass cockpits, new interiors, Recaros and BMW RR engines.The old Valujet/pre-Airtran was the launch customer then TWA on those.
I would love to get to fly the 1011 as mentioned by another poster again, but sadly that won't happen.Loved those on takeoff on the short TPA/ATL routes, lots of fun and great power from those RR RB-211's.
Enjoy the Nine while you can, it'll be gone soon like the TriStars.

I spent a fair amount of time as a kid on the Convair 580 when they were the backbone of North Central's fleet. Those planes eventually became NW birds for a while via the Southern/Republic mergers. That plane was built like a tank.

My friend is a 777 pilot for Delta and he agrees that all passenger jets can 'powerback' but they would never do it because it would blow debris all over the place and planes don't have rear view mirrors!

I remember being on NWA flights that powerbacked in small airports, but come to think of it, never with Delta.

My first flight ever was on CV 580. Loved the Blue Goose livery.

I remember when Delta had DC-9s, and I remember being glad to fly on 727's instead of the rickety old DC-9s. So it is a little unsettling to me to be flying on such an ancient plane again.

North Central used the 580s like Greyhound buses. I used to fly on one that did MSP, Ironwood, Escanaba, Green Bay, Oshkosh, MKE, and finally on to ORD from where it might continue on with MSN, CWA, Rhinelander, Ironwood, and back to MSP. With all of the small airports the 580 flew into, I recall a lot of missed approaches and on to the next city during winter in Minnesota, the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, and Wisconsin.

Normally I would agree...the planes are older, but to the point of many others, the DC-9 is built like a brick-s***house. I feel more than safe on the plane, it's more of an issue of comfort. But hey, as long as I am in J, it's nice and quiet. :D

I've been told by a tech ops metals guy that it is a simple fact that in terms of structural failure points they know more about the DC9-50 than any other plane in the fleet. What that translates into is a statistically safer aircraft structure because tech ops knows when to inspect and repair any given component better than they do on other aircraft. There may be greater risk in other areas, for example flight deck workload in bad weather and high density situations due to the steam gauges versus state of the art glass cockpits. Of course the DC9-50 guys are likely to be on top of things all the time since they spend more time flying the plane and less time monitoring the plane. These are a series of tradeoffs, but ultimately if its in the DL fleet it is absolutely safe.

So you're saying they know where the brakes are on the DC-9 and we won't see a thread like the Boeing 737-700 aircraft rolls off taxiway at ATL during engine test — NO PAX on board one with a DC-9?

That's a shame!

Absolutely nothing wrong with the DC-9s. They are a nice ride and they beat the CRJs any time.

I would suspect that the Diesel Nine drivers are also among the most experienced pilots around, which is a good thing; I likes my pilots with a touch of gray.