Icecat

29) In the spring of 1986, Air Wisconsin was operating nonstop jet service between Chicago O'Hare and two destinations in New England. Identify both of them as well as the aircraft type Air Wis flew on these routes.
Aircraft - BAe 146-200
Destinations: New Haven and Bridgeport, CT.

jlemon

29) Correct! It appears Air Wisconsin primarily operated these flights into and out of Bridgeport and New Haven on "triangle" routings such as ORD-HVN-BDR-ORD or ORD-BDR-HVN-ORD.

jrl767

let's open the bidding:
-206
-306
-306 Combi
-406

if you want to get technical, KLM actually modified some of their -200s to the -200SUD "Stretched Upper Deck" configuration, which was essentially indistinguishable from an as-built -300; I'm not sure if any Combi jets were part of this sub-fleet

WHBM

Actually most were. 7 of their 10 Stretched Upper Deck 747s were Combis, only 3 were standard, and all 3 of those built as 300s were Combis. They didn't convert their older 200s, but these were all sold off by 1993.

Few other airlines took the stretch, it was a very expensive engineering operation, especially as the 747 flight controls are routed through the roof, and really didn't add a lot to capacity. Strangely, despite the extra accommodation it does add a bit to fuel economy.

jlemon

31) I'll cut to the chase here as I'm planning to head out of town on business tomorrow for several days and thus will not have my airline reference material with me.....that is, I hope to depart tomorrow morning unless a big ice storm develops here in south Louisiana overnight - it's currently 36 degrees F at LFT with scattered rain showers in the area, the temp is continuing to drop and the night is young.

The basis for this quiz item are the flight schedules in an OAG from the fall of 1993 from Amsterdam (AMS) to Montreal (YMX). KLM Royal Dutch was the only air carrier providing nonstop service on the route. Four different equipment types are listed as being operated by KLM from AMS to YMX:

* Boeing 747-100/200 passenger - OAG aircraft code 747

* Boeing 747-100/200 mixed configuration (Combi pax & freight service) - OAG aircraft code 74M

* Boeing 747-300 passenger - OAG aircraft code 743

* Boeing 747-300 mixed configuration (Combi pax & freight service) - OAG aircraft code 74D

BTW, back in the day, CP Air flew nonstop between Montreal and Amsterdam with DC8 and Super DC8 aircraft......

And with that, I'll be taking a break from posing and answering quiz items for a couple of days until I return home.

spotwelder

Hi, just joining in the thread but not had time to read the previous thousands of posts in detail. In case it wasn't mentioned before, the RAF TriStar service from Brize Norton via Wideawake to Mount Pleasant had the seating facing forward. The certification of the seats in the L-1011 did not allow rearward facing as it imposes higher stress loads on the seat during the accident deceleration. The centre of gravity of the body is higher when sitting up facing rearwards when compared with the bent forward brace position. This makes the forces on the rear attachment to the floor higher and the seat back loads higher too.

The seats were high-density, as were the Army occupants. I don't remember the cabin food as up to much but the crew food was better.

You cannot file a flight plan from South America to Mount Pleasant. You have to file it to the Malvinas otherwise it gets rejected by the Argentinian ATC system as an invalid destination. It also showed up as Las Malvinas last time I worked in Punta Arenas on the passenger information displays.



57. Following a delicious luncheon 38000 feet over New Mexico and Arizona, you decide to while away an hour or two in the International Lounge. Name the airline and aircraft upon which you’d be flying.

Not sure if anyone else has picked this up but very unlikely to be 38000 feet, as it wasn't a cruising flight level at that point in time. After Reduced Vertical Separation Minimum came into force, it might be possible. Also I am not sure that half way through the flight that 38000 would be possible with a heavy load for N601BN. Westbound it might be FL350 or FL390.

This aircraft was used later on the DFW LGW run and at some point its smaller, but importantly taller, N603/4/6BN 747SP also in orange would be found parked at the next gate. These were known as Orange Juice and Orange Squash, in this combination.

WHBM

Ah, Spotty, we've missed your ascerbic commentary on the thread here to date, where I have ploughed a lonely furrow from this side of the ocean defending Imperial, BOAC, The Junior Jet Club, and all that. Not to mention the products of Ilyushin, Tupolev etc

I think some others here will know Wideawake as Ascension Island, and Mount Pleasant as Falklands. We did the Falkland flights around post #2584 (#2592 for the forward facing seats). Did you get the inbound fighter escort to MPN ?

spotwelder

I did get an escort into the Falklands. The other jumpseat rider was the new station commander so we had the interesting experience of trying to get a TriStar in formation with a C-130 Hercules and a F-4 Phantom II in 1987. It was great watching the fighter showing off very close to us and the Herc flat out to keep up. Don't forget the domestic services in the BN-2A too.

The other big memory of the flight was the outbound landing on Ascension with the USAF ATC providing the voices. We landed and got into the turn around loop at the end of the runway and stopped. We asked for the "follow-me" vehicle. ATC sounded incredulous and repeated their rejoin the runway and backtrack to the apron/ramp. We asked for the vehicle again and obviously the controller thought we were idiots. The captain then stated "I will taxi to the ramp when the follow-me vehicle has moved the donkey out of the way". The operations vehicle was despatched towards us without any further comment from the controller.

Seat 2A

Welcome to the Old Timer's Airline and Airliner Quiz, spotwelder!

We look forward to your participation. More than just questions and answers, we welcome and benefit from commentary and discussion. The repartee between you and WHBM is immediately illustrative of both the educational and entertainment value of this. Indeed WHBM, like a favorite uncle, has often regaled us with numerous tales of airline history - not to mention his own. It's all good.

57. Following a delicious luncheon 38000 feet over New Mexico and Arizona, you decide to while away an hour or two in the International Lounge. Name the airline and aircraft upon which you’d be flying.

Not sure if anyone else has picked this up but very unlikely to be 38000 feet, as it wasn't a cruising flight level at that point in time. After Reduced Vertical Separation Minimum came into force, it might be possible. Also I am not sure that half way through the flight that 38000 would be possible with a heavy load for N601BN. Westbound it might be FL350 or FL390.

This aircraft was used later on the DFW LGW run and at some point its smaller, but importantly taller, N603/4/6BN 747SP also in orange would be found parked at the next gate. These were known as Orange Juice and Orange Squash, in this combination.

N601BN is spot on! As the one who formulated the question, I must plead guilty to the error in altitude. Truth be known, while my interest level in commercial aviation is high, my knowledge relative to many of our participants is strictly pedestrian. As such, 38000 sounded good at the time I submitted the question. It still does, though I assure you clarifying information such as you've provided is appreciated by all. ^

spotwelder

Glad to be back on FT and conversing about world travel with all. My memories of certain events fade with time but some of the technicalities will always be there.

and if anyone can help my brainfade with the airline that had 727s on the American register but appeared with one example sporting British Airways titles that would help! Not the full colo(u)r scheme just titles. Might have been blue and gold stripes. It was based in the UK for a season as an extra aircraft to cover the HS121 Trident fleet on domestic shuttle duties.

WHBM

Aha. That was American Trans Air in summer 1988 with an old United 727, It was used mainly on the BA Shuttle from London to Glasgow as a Backup aircraft when the first section was full. It was leased at a huge hourly rate, but the backups normally only did one or two trips per day. BA regularly seemed to go through aircraft shortages at this time, and it was to cover these (incidentally, the last Trident went at the end of 1985).

It also featured back at post #2957 back in this thread, and was immediately answered, even with a photo.

Indelaware

This site might be helpful to those interested in hybrid liveries: https://www.flickr.com/groups/hybrid_airline_liveries/

WHBM

I'm still shocked that Seat 2A regards me as geriatric enough to be their uncle, favourite or not

spotwelder

Many thanks for correcting to old mind here. It would have substituted a 757 then. I do remember seeing at Manchester a few times. It was the one aircraft on BA shuttle regular duties that I did not fly on. Part of the shuttle promotion was the ability for BA to put random aircraft, even Concorde, on the services...

The fastest flight time I know of was 24 minutes at Mach 0.88 in the Trident. Full service breakfast and payment for the flight included in that period of time. Makes throwing a bag of nuts at you on longer sectors look rather lame for cabin service.

WHBM

This always got the media attention. The actual Concorde sectors flown were generally training runs they would have been doing anyway (when they commonly went from Heathrow to Shannon and back). It was classically done the week that competitor British Midland started their "Diamond Service" in the cabin, full meals for all, on the Glasgow run, when BA put Concorde on one of the rotations that came into Glasgow right when the B Mid opening press conference was taking place. Guess what made its way into all the newspaper pieces the next morning.

Not so much a Gripper after all, then.