I just saw a picture of what looked like United colors on a L1011. Having flown United many years. I have never seen a United L1011. American and United only flewn DC10’s?
From United’s website.
They were 500 series obtained when United took over Pan Am’s Pacific division. Don’t believe the lasted too long with United.
Thanks I didn’t think they would use both DC10’s and L1011’s. PAN AM that explains everything.
Did anybody else fly L-1011’s and DC-10’s concurrently?
That is, besides Delta after the Western merger…
British Airways after the Caledonian merger.
PRIOR to the Delta/Western merger, Delta flew all three of the then available widebodies (747, L-1011, DC-10). They had ordered the L-1011 but due to production delays, they also took delivery of the DC-10.
The L-1011 was in Delta service from about 1973 to 1992, the DC-10 from about 1972 to 1987, and the 747 from 1970 to 1977.
The MD-11 was also in the Delta fleet from 1990 to 1996 so for a couple of years (1990-1992), Delta was flying two types of widebody trijets at the same time.
After National merged into Pan Am, Pan Am also flew the DC-10 and L-1011 together, along with the 747.
http://flytristar.tripod.com/article/art07.html
According to this website, Delta flew L-1011’s throught 2001. I flew on a Delta L-1011 to Europe after 1992. I also knew a Delta L-1011 captain who was flying them up until about 2001.
Delta flew their MD-11’s until 2003 or 2004
Wazzu90 is correct. The year 1992 is actually the year that the last L-1011 was delivered to Delta.
I just remembered…Hawaiian may have done it, too. They had replaced their L-1011’s with DC-10’s, and may have had both running durng that transition.
I saw what appeared to be a L1011 at KIAD the other day. Looked to be some kind of military version (or esle GA version painted grey).
The L1011 at IAD may have belonged to the German Air Force. They have a long history of stoping at IAD.
IAD is often used as a stop for other foriegn military aircraft because ADW is not open to routine transients.
Who must have captured it then. Britain’s RAF is the only one using L1011s.
That’s what I thought.
The RAF did it right. They replaced their VC-10, a beautiful aircraft in my opinion, with another beautiful aircraft - the L-1011.
It’s been a while since I worked at IAD so the aircraft may very well have been an RAF aircraft.
Is there an upcoming Red Flag excercise? It may have been a fuel stop.
Compared to NWA, that is not a long life for a plane. As they say, when the A330’s from NWA are retired, the pilots will ride home on a DC-9.
The L-1011 didn’t have all the problems the DC-10 had, right?
Apparently, the L-1011’s life cycle wasn’t as high as the DC-10. I’ve also heard a few “moving walls” stories about the Tristar…
The L1011 became a bit of a maintenance boondoggle after Lockheed stopped supporting it and all of the plane’s quadruple redundancies and what not, while making it safer and more reliable, also made it more expensive to maintain.
When Eastern was flying L1011’s, during the mid 70’s they were having compressor stall problems during take-off with the number 2 engine.
The company instituted a procedure where by the pilot was required to run-up the #2 engine for as long as one minute on the runway after receiving a take-off clearance.
Sounds like a serious maintenance issue to me. 