I came across a mention of Interflug flying the JFK-SXF (Berlin-Schoenfeld) route here.

First off, is it true that this happened? Secondly, how was it done? I know that Interflug's IL-62s couldn't do the route nonstop, so I'm assuming that they would stop in Gander and/or Shannon. However, could the A310s that Interflug got during the dying days of the GDR/DDR have done the route nonstop?

And on a much more random note, imagine if Interflug had managed to survive somehow (I know in reality they had less than a snowball's chance in h***) and given LH competition from it's SXF hub as a member of OneWorld.

The IL-62s could do the route nonstop. It was designed for flights like JFK-SVO. It couldn't go the JFK-SXF (or SVO for that matter) with a full payload, but it wouldn't have any problem flying to SXF with a slight weight limit. Don't know if they flew the route, but they were perfectly capable of doing so.

Dunno about the US, but Interflug did fly to Havana and possibly some Central or South American ciities, using Shannon as their refueling stop.

Interflug did not fly to the US at all. All down to diplomacy but presumably there was little or no commercial demand either. They did operate to Havana, Cuba, using Shannon and/or Gander and/or Santa Maria, Azores, as refuelling stops, but kept well clear offshore from US airspace, the same as Cubana flights did (ironically US flights overfly Cuba all the time - apparently Havana Center now speaks better English than Miami does !) The Il-62M (the re-engined and updated one - Interflug had them) could indeed have attempted New York to Berlin - they did New York and Toronto to Warsaw for LOT for years. However Havana is a lot further and needs a fuel stop.

Interflug also did not fly to the Western Europe "allies" countries like Britain or France either, nor West Germany, although they did get to Netherlands and such like on regular flights. There were very occasional Interflug charter flights to the UK, with ships crews and similar, generally using the old Il-18 big turboprops.

Interflug did indeed attempt to compete as a commercial airline. That's what the A310s were for. They business was gone in months however !

Very enlightening.

On another note, I've read that when traveling to East Berlin, it was always referred to as "Berlin, the Capital of the GDR" or "Democratic Berlin", not as East Berlin.

Of course. Rest assured, they didn't call it "East Germany" either... and should you ever meet a North Korean, don't call his country anything but the DPR of Korea.

Yes, if you didn't say "GDR" or plain "Berlin" you were finished ! I guess it was a prototype for the Political Correctness now sweeping the west. There was a famous case, 1970s I think, of a truckload of Collins Road Atlases of Europe, printed in Britain and headed for West Berlin, being stopped on the Autobahn corridor to West Berlin and seized because they had printed "East Germany" !

Back to Interflug, they had a lot of trouble with their aircraft registrations. They started off as DDR- in the 1950s, then changed to D- , the same as West Germany, until the ICAO put their foot down about the confusion and they were all changed again to DM- . Finally in the 1980s someone said "Ooooh, looks like the West German DM currency symbol", and so they were all changed again back to DDR-.

During Interflug's last years, it used to continue to MEX from HAV with their A310's (once a weel IIRC). I remember seeing the Interflug A310 on the ramp at MEX for the first time and not believing my eyes.... Who on earth would be on these flights??

Those 2-3 A310's now fly for the Luftwaffe, and usually serve to transport the chancellor and/or foreign minister where they need to go.

Also, I did a quick search through the airliners.net database and came up with the following East Bloc flights to the US:

Aeroflot: JFK-SVO with IL-62M
CSA Czechoslovakian Airlines: JFK-PRG with IL-62M
JAT Yugoslavian Airlines (do they even count as a communist country?): various US cities (I think JFK, ORD, LAX) with DC-10s
LOT Polish Airlines: JFK-WAW with IL-62M
Tarom Romanian Airlines: JFK-OTP with IL-62M

As far as I can tell Malev did not fly the IL-62 at all, neither did Balkan Bulgarian.

Those Ilyushins used to fly SVO-IAD too, once a week

Probably for the use of the KGB's Washington Rezidentura.

Reports of the death of the IL-62 are a great exaggeration. I saw one only a couple of weeks ago, belonging to Kras Air, make a typically elegant and stately takeoff from St Petersburg. The last ones completed were only shipped in 1996, and in fact the final airframes are apparently still left at the Kazan factory in an incomplete state. But there are plenty of them still with the "new" operators out of Moscow Domodedovo. Even the old Interflug ones have found good homes there. Here's the old DDR-SER of Interflug (built 1985), now with Russian charter operator Vim Airlines, seen this summer as far apart as Moscow, Dubai and Macau.

In addition to the flights from Moscow, after Perestroika Aeroflot started an IL-62 service from Khabarovsk, in the Soviet Far East, through Anchorage, to Seattle and Los Angeles. These flights only lasted a few years, like the quite extensive Aeroflot "mini-hub" that operated at this time at Miami, between Moscow and Latin America. In recent years Aeroflot have got a lot more commercial and have dumped many of the old politically-inspired routes. They still do 2 flights a week from Moscow to Havana, nonstop now with the Il-96.

If you are into Russian aircraft DME is practically a living museum. They've even got an old Tu-114 out front which used to do Moscow-New York in the 60's.

Loads of Il-62's (Dalavia, Domodedovo, VIM), Tu-154's (Sibir, and others), Tu-134's, and Yak-40/42's.

Unfortunately, didn't get to fly in an IL-62, had to settle for a Yak . Fly in one of those and you'll nevery complain about CRJ's again!

Also if you're in Moscow and interested in old Russian airliners make the trip out to Monino air museum. If you're a foreigner you have to get permission from them in advance (details on website). They have one of every old Soviet airliner, including that Tu114 LHR Tim mentions, and some amazing Air Force transports too. Take the Monino suburban train from Yaroslavl station to the end of the line, then it's about a 20 minute walk through an Air Force Base (no checking though) to the museum buried in the woods.

They have an English language guidebook with pictures of everything, written by one of the staff there who is a retired Yak test pilot. Interesting guy to talk to !

Hi,

Talking about the IL62 and their operators just to add that Aeroflot in the 70's and 80's operated flights from SVO to Central and South America with stops in FRA and LIS. At one point there were at least 2 or 3 flights via LIS, to HAV, to MEX and to LIM all of them with IL62M's. Besides that Aeroflot also had a flight SVO to LIS with TU154B's. Regarding other "iron curtain" airline flights there was some pretty unique ones, for example TAROM flew a flight from Bucharest to Nouakchott in Mauritania via LIS with TU154's and sometimes they used the IL62 too. BALKAN had regular flights from Bourgas to move sailman's that had their fishing boats docked in LIS, they normally used the TU154 or the IL18's. From all the other airlines I also remember seeing CSA doing at one point regular flights from Prague to LIS operating the TU134A's and the IL62M's...the rest of them, Interflug, LOT and MALEV only came on charter flights from time to time...LOT I remember seeing IL18 and IL62, Interflug I saw here TU134A's and MALEV an IL18.
Regards