Originally Posted by
rog747
i was at BMA 76-85 at LHR traffic/ops coordinator
Ah. Then you may have been peripherally involved in what was my finest hour at check-in, probably about 1982-83.
BMA had started Glasgow, and I was making a trip up there. There was a cheap "non-changeable" return fare on the 13.00 lunchtime flight, which saved the office budget a bit over the BA Shuttle (goodness knows why I did this, I never saw any personal benefit from doing so). Just before setting off from our office in The City to the Underground about 10.45 a phone call comes in from our Australia office which went on and on. Suddenly I realise it's 11.30, roar out of the office to the District Line, out to Barons Court, wait and wait for a Heathrow Piccadilly, OhMyGodI'mNotGoingToMakeIt, finally onwards .... how many more stations .... three minutes a station .... oh no Hounslow West to Hatton Cross is a huge distance ,OhMyGodI'mNotGoingToMakeIt .... finally into Heathrow tube station at 12.48, leap up escalator and along passages, no queue at BMA, told "just a chance", no queue at security, aircraft on first stand on right down the pier (stand 2 ?), give BP, in, doors of the DC9-10 close behind me, OTD at 13.00, 12 minutes after I arrive in the tube station
Now then,
rog747, if I'd just missed it, would you have kindly endorsed my non-endorseable onto the 15.00 ?
Also recall going up to Teesside, maybe 1988, in one of the ex-Indonesian DC9-30s. Full reverse and braking on touchdown. My briefcase whizzes forward down the aisle most of the way to the front. C'mon guys, MME's runway is not that short.
Last DC9 I ever rode in was about 1995, returning from Edinburgh one evening, which by then was all 737-400 on BMA, but there was an aircraft sub and a DC9 was on the rotation. More than a little tatty inside, but I believe ValuJet bought the last ones from BMA.
how nasty an F27 on the MME!
I more than once had to endure one on Waterford to Luton. My last-ever Dart-powered flights. Noisy little thing abeam the props.
As for WLAD, who knows ??
Ended up like so many One-Elevens with Okada Air in Nigeria, last heard of derelict and dumped at Benin over there, towards the end of the 1990s.