Flights such as this http://flightaware.com/live/flight/GFT5401 are they scheduled or positioning flights?
Looking at the history for this particular flight for the past few months and looking at GFT flights overall, I would have to say it is a positioning flight. (The other GFT flights were all in the 9xxx series.)
I remember flying (circa 1973) JFK-MIA in an Eastern L1011 that stopped in FLL for about 30 minutes. I think air time FLL-MIA was about 5 minutes. I’m sure we didn’t climb higher than 3000 feet, if that much.
I’d say positioning too. If you search for flights between the three NYC airports,
you will always see aircraft being moved around to cover problems.
Never flew it but in the early 70’s, WN had a HOU-IAH (21nm) then on to DAL flight.
May as well just left the gear and flaps down for that one.
You sure that was Southwest? They started service at IAH when they first began flying but in 1972 moved all services to HOU. They didn’t resume services until 1980.
Continental did operate a DC-9 between HOU and IAH for a short time. I cannot find the years it was operated. I do know it was with baby DC-9s. It was eventually changed to ATR-42’s.
That was the story the way I remember it. It must have been in the 1971-72 time frame when they only had 2 or 3 jets and this was the only way to cover both airports. I’ll keep digging for more info.
I vaguely remember (circa late 60s, maybe early 70s) UA flying DC8-61s from ORD and/or DEN to SFO with a stop at Oakland … that would have been a scenic flight (what, about 5 min?) across the Bay.
They did not serve IAH and HOU concurrently until 1980. In 1972 Keller said it was stupid for people to travel 45 minutes to IAH to take a 40 minute flight so all services were transferred to HOU. It wasn’t until 1980 that Southwest flew to both IAH and HOU at the same time
There’s been several airlines flying between the three Bay Area commercial airports.
TWA flew between SFO and SJC with jet aircraft (either 707’s or 727’s or both)
Western flew between OAK and SJC with 720’s and 707’s as part of flights to Hawaii
Horizon flew F28’s between OAK and SJC for a short period within the last 10 years.
Looking at timetables for PSA and Air California, it appears that they had flights jet flights (727’s and 737’s respectively) between all three airports, although the times were not shown in the timetables.