Originally Posted by
virginblue
Fascinating stuff, thanks. You mentioned PA's acquisition of National. Didn't National serve LGW in its own right from MIA (like a couple of other European destinations - I recall FRA, for example)
No, National were always at Heathrow, they just sneaked in before the Bermuda rules described above were implemented.
Now, National's first few years on LHR-Miami were not with their own aircraft, but on chartered DC8s from supplemental Airlift, who painted up two of their DC8-54F into National colours, although only one was required for the daily round trip. This was because, like most of the US mainstream domestic carriers of the day, National may have had DC8s in the fleet but had no aircraft equipped for overwater intercontinental flights, no full raft provision, HF radio, overwater training, or any such. It was a good contract for Airlift, much of whose business came from the US military which needed this full kit, flying to Europe, South-East Asia, etc. And so, as only one of the two DC8 was required, and as Airlift's small fleet of them did other affinity and military transatlantic charter work, it's quite feasible that the second aircraft turned up at Gatwick, or Mildenhall, or wherever, from time to time in full National colours, though it would have been on an Airlift flight number.