727 Cargo Transporter@East London
 

Hi all
I was wondering if anyone knew what happened to the 727 Cargo plane that used to be parked on the apron at East London Airport-ICAO:FAEL
I assume it did routes from East London to Johannesburg FAOR
A 737-200 (ZS-SID) had replaced its role round about 2003/04...(uncertain though)
Im asking because I remember seeing it when I was a child.I thought back then it was an "Army jet." My dad agreed with me so as to get me all excited when it taxied past the terminal.(He owned Spitfires Restaurant upstairs.)
If you could also provide me with its callsign,I would appreciate it.If not,no worries:ok:
Thanks everyone

Dan

Hi,

The mentioned B727 s/n 20757/1002 started off with Lufthansa as D-ABQI in 1974 and flew until 1992. Then it was re-registered to ZS-NWA and flew for Imperial Air Cargo, Sun Air and also for Safair (not sure of the order or who leased it to who though) until it was scrapped back in 2008 i believe.

Hope this helped.

Regards,

booze

Hi there Booze
Thanks for the info.Sad to hear that it has been scrapped..A search on the internet of the callsign does verify that this is indeed the one I am familiar with.
Thanks again

Dan

Hi Dan

I flew that plane during the time period you are talking about. In fact I did my command rating on that plane with Safair. We flew for a crowd called Air World then Imperial cargo. Our routing was JHB-DBN-PE-EL {day stop} then flew the reverse home to JHB that evening. It was a good plane. It was a passenger plane converted to a freighter. The routing eventually changed and so we stopped going to East London. Like booze said it was eventually scrapped.

727 in general was a great plane to fly and is definitely one of my favorite. Way more fun than the plastic button pushing we work with these days.

Cheers