cs57

4) Air Service at Titusville, FL--Looking at a copy of an Eastern Airlines timetable, I can see that it was on Eastern; the flight was from/to Orlando. I would think the jet used was D9S or 727.

jlemon

2) Texas International (TI) with a DC-9-10. Some of these LAX-ABQ flights also provided onestop, direct service to other destinations such as Roswell (ROW).

BTW, had an excellent flight yesterday afternoon/evening chasing the sunset nonstop from IAH to LAX on board UA's very first Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner up in the front cabin. What a great airplane! The Captain gave a terrific welcome on board speech that touched upon his 40 years of flying jets for the airlines with the comment that the opportunity to fly the 787 was the real icing on the cake with regard to his aviation career. On board service by the cabin crew was superb as well! Thanks to UA for a truly great flight on board the Dreamliner!

Also, I have yet to provide an answer to my question 14) concerning seasonal service operated into GJT by UA but will do so when I return to Louisiana and my old, beat up OAG from 1976!

jlemon

15) I'm going to go with the Proud Bird with the Golden Tail, being Continental Airlines, on this one with regard to service between BUR and SEA.

When I flew on this route, the equipment was a B727-200.

However, as the time line is back in 1970, the aircraft may well have been a Boeing 720B......

Seat 2A

Excellent answers from both cs57 and jlemon on the above questions. Eastern was flying a once daily DC-9-30 into Titusville from McCoy Field (MCO) back in 1973. These days, Titusville no longer receives any commercial air service.

Although it seems like a Continental route, ABQ-LAX was served by both TWA and Texas International. TWA didn't operate its DC-9s out west, so that leaves Texas International. I loved their brightly colored DC-9s as well as the drinks served in their big Texas Tumblers.

Burbank-Seattle was indeed flown by Continental. Some of the flights operated via San Jose and Portland and in the early 1970s at least, the Boeing 720B was the aircraft of choice.

N965VJ

You could play footsie with the person sitting across from you. US didn't have F until the PI merger in 1989. At first there was only one row of F on the DC-9s, with just a piece of fabric attached between the top of the seat and the overhead. It looked as silly as it sounds, and eventually another row was added with a solid divider.

Seat 2A

I beg to differ on the First Class service unless you're referring only to its inclusion aboard DC-9s. I flew US Air First Class on a couple of occasions in 1982 and 83 and it was a pretty nice service as well. Once was in December of 1982 between PIT and DFW on a new 727-200 and the other was a roundtrip between PIT and SFO, both operated with 727-200s. Service was from the trolley and the flights were excellent except when all four smokers in Row 4 were lighting up at the same time.

jlemon

Well, since I appear to be on a roll here, let's try one more on a beautiful afternoon in Pasadena, CA (with snow showers occurring up in the nearby San Gabriel mountains).....

8) MSY-BWI nonstops: Delta, Eastern and Texas International. DL and EA probably with 72S equipment, and TI with a D9S, I think......

Seat 2A

Laissez les bons temps rouler, Mr. Lemon!

WHBM

Back with just a couple of items that may interest. A previous run at former US airline offices in London was a bit of an obscure area for the crew here, so let’s go back to the Western Hemisphere.

1973-4, A new service started twice a week from Lima, Peru to Tokyo. The oil crisis of the following year knocked it on the head. Can you identify the airline, and also the intermediate stop.

Also at this time, an operation from New York JFK to Guadalajara, with continuing service on to Puerto Vallarta.

Can we identify these flights ?

jlemon

Good evening, WHBM!

I'm unsure with regard to the answer concerning the Lima-Tokyo route but am looking forward to the identity of the carrier, the intermediate stop (LAX perhaps?) and the equipment utilized.....

However, I believe I know the answer to your second question: Air France operating a Boeing 707 with an actual routing of CDG-JFK-GDL-PVR. And if memory serves me correctly, this was not a daily service but did operate on a scheduled basis several days a week....

BTW, the one and only time I flew into PVR was on board an Alaska Airlines MD-80 from LAX that had made an intermediate stop at MZT......

Seat 2A

I concur with jlemon on the JFK-PVR service. The man's on a serious roll of late so it would be foolish to choose against him but of course I do remember seeing those AF flights in the OAGs back in the seventies and wishing I had the time and money to take advantage of them.

As to the first part, I seem to remember Air France offering a service back in the early seventies between Tokyo and Lima routing via Fiji or Pago Pago, then on to Papeete and thence on to Lima. I'm pretty sure it was Pago Pago. That would be my first choice because I'm reasonably certain of its existence.

However, you did say identify the intermediate stop, as in singular, and while LAX would seem to have been the logical choice, the only airline I can think of that might have flown LIM-LAX and continued on to Tokyo was Aerolineas Argentinas. Another possibility might have been Vancouver, which might have made sense with CP Air's presence in both South America and Japan, i.e. a Lima-Vancouver-Tokyo run. The 5070 miles between Lima and YVR was slightly less than the 5440 mile LAX-TYO sector.

It'll be interesting to find out...

cs57

WHBM: 1973-74 Route Lima/XX/TYO-- was VARIG using DC10 via LAX (twice a week)

WHBM

Nice and quick from all.

S2A is the closest, for it was indeed Air France who had a shot at this, routing Lima-Papeete-Tokyo. Lima to Papeete is actually the shorter leg, but the whole thing is around 1,000 nm longer than going through LAX.

Air France was always sore that UTA got the licences to serve Papeete, which became not only a tourist point but also a significant base for the French military, with much traffic to/from Paris. However to get there on UTA it was necessary to either go the long way round, as we have previously discussed, from Paris through Singapore and Noumea, or to take Air France from Paris to LAX and connect onto UTA there. This new way got AF themselves into Papeete, by what I believe you American Football followers would call an End Run. It also connected with AF Paris services at both Lima and Tokyo, and was portrayed as a "round the world" service as well. Indeed, the aircraft appears to have operated right through from Paris at both ends

I guess loads on the leg from Lima must have been particularly thin. When it was withdrawn UTA picked up the Tokyo leg and from their Papeete base developed tourist traffic from Japan to Tahiti, though it generally ran only once/twice a week.

Table 5a here :

http://www.timetableimages.com/ttima...74/af74-10.jpg

And yes, JFK to Guadalajara and Puerto Vallarta was also on Air France, two of the secondary Mexican points European carriers tried to serve at the time (Lufthansa did Monterrey, for example). By 1974 this 5 times a week service was rather a tour-de-force, where flight AF77 involved three aircraft, a Caravelle from Nice to Paris, transferring directly onto a B747 from there to New York, and another transfer onto a 707 for the Mexican legs. I wonder how many people ever boarded that Caravelle on the Mediterranean shores at Nice headed for Puerto Vallarta ... !

jlemon

Good morning from sunny but cold southern California! From my hillside vantage point looking east from Pasadena, I can see fresh snow on Mt. Baldy (elevation 10,064 feet and still apparently rising with each earthquake) while it appears to be still snowing to beat the band further east in the Big Bear area high in the San Bernardino mountains.....

Excellent response, WHBM, and, as usual, most interesting! And speaking of Lufthansa, the German carrier also served Merida on the Yucatan peninsula of Mexico at one point as well......

LH 482: Frankfurt-Montreal-Merida-Mexico City

Back in July of 1972, Lufthansa flew the above routing once a week with a Boeing 707. The question is: why Merida?!

And let's not forget the contribution by cs57 to this discussion! Varig indeed flew between Lima and Tokyo via LAX.....and before the service was operated with a DC-10, it was flown with a Boeing 707.....

RG 814: Sao Paulo-Rio de Janiero-Lima-Los Angeles-Tokyo (note: the Sao Paulo-Rio leg was operated with an L-188 Electra II using the same flight number)

Back in July of 1971, Varig was flying this routing three times a week. Interestingly, on Mondays and Wednesdays, first and coach cabin services were offered but on Fridays only coach cabin service was available......

miniliq

I think these are still out there:
9) nonstop MSY-JAX -- Texas International with a DC-9
10) Bit of a guess -- I don't think any of them except SAN had nonstop service to HNL.