I remember the Chicago event. It’s interesting that some aircraft get their lives extended forever (e.g., the B-52 and the 737) and others age out.
2 thoughts on “The Louisville Crash”
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I remember the Chicago event. It’s interesting that some aircraft get their lives extended forever (e.g., the B-52 and the 737) and others age out.
Comments are closed.
Military aircraft generally fly way fewer hours than do airliners. Which is likely why the B-52 is still flying along with the KC-135. I’m not sure how many Boeing 737-100 and 200 are still flying. What is called the 737 has new wings, tail, engines and a greatly stretched fuselage along with totally new avionics. The design is just like grandpa’s axe.
My wife and I were booked on a DC-10 from Melbourne, Australia to Auckland in 1979 when the Chicago accident happened so we got to fly on one of the Air New Zealand DC-8’s that were being retired, which was pretty neat, apart from a night in the terminal (sometime around 11pm, the terminal staff went home and they turned off the heating and it was the middle of winter) and 4am departure, as it is the only 4 engine narrow body I’ve ever flown on.
One more Pegasus launch and the L-1011 goes extinct. The USAF took its last KC-10 out of service last year so if, as this author suggests, the Louisville crash spells the end of the DC-10/MD-11 in the commercial aviation world, then the last of the modern widebody tri-motors will be gone.
With the last BAC-111 Trident having been retired six years ago, that leaves less than two dozen Boeing 727s still keeping the narrowbody tri-motor flame alive.
I flew on every one of the modern tri-motors back in the day. Didn’t like any of them, but then I’ve never cared for flying in general. Did it when I had to for work. Never flew for vacations. Flew from my Upper Peninsula home to my Lower Peninsula university the first time I made the trip. After that, I always drove.
Both the most pleasant, and most unpleasant flights I ever made were in DC-10s. The pleasant one was an American DC-to-L.A. red-eye in the mid-70s. Not a hint of turbulence the whole trip and the flight crew gave we poor wretches in economy class some of the delicious turkey and corned beef sandwiches prepared for 1st class and which proved surplus to need. Scariest flight was a Denver-to-L.A. jaunt in the mid-80s following a work meeting that was a complete waste of time. Hit some horrendous turbulence about five minutes after take-off and was paint-shakered for the next half-hour. Could see a wing flexing and a lateral engine bobbing around on its pylon the whole time – not exactly a confidence-inspiring sight.
My last flight was in early 2001. So I’ve never flown during the post-9-11 TSA era as none of the work I’ve done since then has required any air travel. I’m not of the opinion that I’ve missed much.