[alainboy56]

Thanks for the memories ……………… So here goes.
My 1st flight way back in May 1959 so that’s 60 years ago actually on 23/05 – oh my goodness! A BOAC DH Comet4 to Tokyo via Beirut, Karachi, Calcutta, BKK and HKG.
Return was partly by a similar aircraft to HKG and SIN where it went u/s and so changed to a QF Super Connie to LHR via CMB, BOM, KHI, Cairo, IST and Rome. (31:45 flying time if anyone is interested).
Other aircraft include B707-336’s VC-10’s, B747-136’s, L1011’s, Tridents 2’s and 3’s, BAC1-11’s, B737-236’s and B747-236’s – all of these of BOAC/BEA/BA
B720B’s of Monarch, DC-9-32’s of Avianca, New York Air and AZ, B727 of NW Orient, Many more L1011’s and B737-200’s of GF also L1011-500’s of TAP.
Pan Am B747-121’s and also their B747SP’s. A300’s of Dan Air, TransAer and Olympic, F-27’s, SD-360’s and BAe146-200’s of AirUK, Viscounts and SD-330’s of British Air Ferries, SD-330’s of Guernsey Airlines, BN Trislanders of Aurigny, a HP Herald of South East Air, BAC1-11’s of British Island Airways, L1011-1 of Peach Air. A jump seat ride from JNB to Livingstone in a Regional Air Convair 580. A310’s of Swissair, Saab SF-340’s of Crossair and lastly many many flights to many interesting stations such as Rahim Yar Khan, Pakistan and Shymkent, Kazakhstan in Ilyushin IL-76’s.

I do hope this list of aircraft has refreshed some memories, not least for the countless airlines that have long since disappeared.

[alainboy56]

@ AMcWhirter Re the VC-10 routes with BA —- Didn’t they use it on the early evening BA591 LHR-LAX route, which eventually went onto HNL, AUK and SYD.
My father flew on this route regularly. I think it did LAX non stop. The range of the VC-10 was not that bad at all. By the way, the record set by a RAF VC-10 from UK (Brize Norton) to Perth has only recently been beaten by a QF B789 on their relatively new route. (Although the VC-10 was refueled in flight).

[cwoodward]

Barnacales wrote: ‘I had a couple of thrilling flights with Buffalo Airways,’

They are still flying the DC-3s and unbelievably they have a fleet of 4 Electra’s still flying.

[alainboy56]

And I did forget a thrilling once in a lifetime trip on a Thruxton Jackaroo (a 4 seat biplane) in the early sixties with my father as acting (he was not type certified) Co-Pilot, so that was probably the oldest aircraft.

[AMcWhirter]

[quote quote=932464]Didn’t they use it on the early evening BA591 LHR-LAX route, which eventually went onto HNL, AUK and SYD.[/quote]

I am sure BOAC never operated its VC-10s non-stop from London to the US West Coast.

When the VC-10s were used for London-Sydney via the Pacific they would stop en route in New York.

https://www.pprune.org/aviation-history-nostalgia/363494-vc-10-a-12.html

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alainboy56

[DGGW]

I posted a long list two days ago but it disappeared when I tried to correct a typo.

Check out my videos at – https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCJGwXLs3Y276msBYFXrrltg

In total I made five flights on the Ju52.

To that I can add Short Sandringham ‘Beachcomber’ in 1977 and many trips on Chalks Grumman Turbo Mallards from Watson Island to Bimini. Several Dakota flights including what I believe was the last flight out of LGW – can’t remember the year but I flew back to LHR on the BCal helicopter link.

Flew on a DanAir Comet 4C from LGW just before it was retired. Next time I saw that aircraft was at Blackbushe in 1985 when they were cutting it up for scrap.

I only made one flight on a Boeing 707 and that was with Arkia from Dov into Eilat in March 1991. Let’s just say the landing was interesting.

But the best of all will always be Concorde G-BOAF JFK-LHR on 13 July 2003.

[GivingupBA]

[quote quote=932762]….In total I made five flights on the Ju52….[/quote]

Ju52, that’s great!

I really wanted to go on a Spitfire flight but they’re quoting £2750 for a 30-minute flight, a bit steep I thought. (Maybe not for some people).

[Remo]

On 19 September 1956 ( I was 10 years old) I have flown on Lockheed L-049 Constellation.
Since then I took more than 5.000 thousand flights for about 7 milions miles and 20.000 hours in the sky.

I have flown on Bristol 175, Vickers/Viscount, Douglas DC-3-, Douglas DC-6, Douglas DC-7 Seven Seas, Concorde, Lockheed Tristar, DC-10, Md-11,.

My favorite aircraft is the Boeing 747. I don’t like the Airbus 3800.

[TiredOldHack2]

Just seen this (why aren’t I getting the notifications??)

Lufthansa flies Tante Jus out of Koln/Bonn. They’re flown by 747 pilots, and they have to do it in their own time.

Some years ago, a friend/contact bought a flight for his elderly father, telling me: “Zer last time he vos in vun vos in 1940, ven he jumped out of vun into Norway!”

Spitfires – on my bucket list. I ticked off a proper descent in a four-man bobsleigh a few years ago. It cost something like 100 euros for a descent that lasted one minute and five seconds which means, believe it or not, that the cost per hour is exactly the same as a trip in a two-seater Spit.

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GivingupBA

[GivingupBA]

[quote quote=933886]Spitfires – on my bucket list. I ticked off a proper descent in a four-man bobsleigh a few years ago. It cost something like 100 euros for a descent that lasted one minute and five seconds which means, believe it or not, that the cost per hour is exactly the same as a trip in a two-seater Spit.[/quote]

You have my respect – I know for sure I would be terrified on a four-man bobsleigh run – more terrified even than I would probably in a Spitfire. 100 Euros sounds a lot, but perhaps the one minute and five seconds felt like a lifetime? It would’ve done for me…

[TiredOldHack2]

Sorry for the late reply. I’m still not getting notifications of replies, and it’s pissing me off.

You’re right: 65 seconds felt like half an hour. You wear neck braces because you’re flung from side to side in a fraction of a second as you go round the vertical banking. And we were pulling 3G on them. We hit 122kph (I have the certificate!).

Apparently, decent race times on this track (Les Arcs) are 55 seconds or below, 130+kph and they pull 3.5+G. We didn’t do a proper race start but just pushed off gently. even so, I can’t imagine what going that fast is like.

What they don’t tell you is that because of the G-forces, the blood drains away from your head and when you get out you’re rocking and rolling around and can’t stand up straight.

They had the team of pilots from La Patrouille de France some months before us, they said, and the pilots, to a man, declared the bobsleigh guys were nutters.

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GivingupBA

[fatbear]

Some of my earliest flights include :

Morton Airways Dove
Laker Airways Brittania, BAC 1-11, B707, DC10
BAF Carvair
Bcal BAC 1-11
Dan Air Comets & B727
DAT F27

About 10 years ago I was given a flight on a Dragon Rapide from Coventry as a Birthday present…….

[BA789]

Hawker Siddeley 748 and Boeing 707 of Zambia Airways in the early 1980s

[Author]

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