Olympic airways A340's
 

Iran (Bek air) just bought 2 of Olympic airways four A340-300's that have sat on the ramp at ATH for 8 years since OA went under in 2009!
the a/c flew out last week from ATH

no paperwork i gather - disgruntled OA employees destroyed the tech logs years ago i heard - that is why OA and then the Greek Govt were never able to be sold -
2 of the 4 lovely aircraft were scrapped a year or 2 ago

C and D survived - nice photo - they were nice inside too great big Y seats and 34 inch legroom
A and B were scrapped in 2013

this week


HH here she is the other evening at ATH before dep to Iran

https://www.jetphotos.com/photo/8510857

Heathrow harry
 

With a Kazakhstan aircraft registration!

Well that, and the fact that you can't give away A342/A343s nowadays.

Monthly leasing rates for A340-300 are about $180k max, half that of a 777-200ER; purchase prices are even softer. So given the fuel-burn difference for the quad is fairly minimal, a few percent, it's be daft *not* to take the A340s for any airline that doesn't operate other 777s.

Hmm. Not sure Iranair bought them. The info I have is that they are sold to Bek Air and the first went to Tehran on 14th Feb for modifications prior to delivery to Bek Air.

I 100% agree, Heathrow Director, a stunning aircraft. Everything about that colour scheme just says 'Greece'. Leaving aside the politics and economics, it's such a shame that OA have ended up where they are now.

Why would Iran Air buy knackered old A340's when they have orders with Airbus and Boeing (provided Trump approves the deal)?

And, repeating myself, why would the aircraft be registered in Kazakhstan?! It's gone to Iran for maintenance, that's all.

not sold to Iran air but Bek air IIRC (2 of - the other 2 got scrapped in 2013)

also the 4 aircraft were sat at ATH since 2009 but the issue of no-sale was i heard, due to disgruntled OA employees destroyed all the aircraft paperwork & tech logs making them in theory difficult or impossible to sell - that may or may not be true but the Greek Govt which eventually were the custodians certainly could not sell them until now -

it was mooted Virgin would have picked them up for a song but with no paperwork the deal did not go through

Bek Air is, of course, just the intermediary. They're going to Syrian Air as UP-A4002 and UP-A4003. Syrian also recently acquired UP-A4001 from Sri Lankan via Bek.

My question is, how would one get these airborne without a tech log?

Now on the Syrian register as YK-AZA.

Arabian Aerospace - Syrianair takes delivery of maiden A340

For anyone that is interested, YK-AZA now in full livery.

https://cdn.jetphotos.com/full/5/42813_1498047654.jpg

It seems speculation about the other two was wrong. UP-A4003 is now EP-MMT for Mahan, not Syrian.

great shot thanks but that one is ex CX not OA

re the OA a/c- they were lovely inside and very comfy seats and leg room with OA

did LHR-ATH one day prob around 2007 or 8 and actually did not want to get off !!
Y leg room was at least 34-36'' and the seat was big solid and roomy
quite happy to have gone on to Jo-burg LOL

ps
of the 4 built new for OA
2 have been scrapped at ATH and these two have flown away for new lives in Iran

i gather there were no flight manual or tech logs for these four that is why they never sold since 2009 when OA were grounded
- wonder how they got round shifting these 2?

true Dave but VS Virgin were sniffing around these back in 2010 and the 4 a/c as a package were going for a song
I heard just 1m euros each BUT they came with no paperwork

SRB liked a bargain and got one of the prototype/demo A340's from AB ship #3 which had lots of extra metal in it but he bought for some silly low price
like 1 euro

SirMB of BMA went down to South Africa in the early 70's and came back with 7 Viscount 800's from SAA with the Sim for less than £100K the lot

he went down with that £100K to buy just one!

Was at SAA at the time and true. Helped to pack up the analogue sim

i was at BMA until 1986 then Monarch
those 7 Viscounts were the backbone for many years for BMA
one of the ex SAA 7 was badly damaged in a crosswind landing at LBA in 1981
G-AZLT and she rebuilt with wings off G-BAPD or PE and re-regd G-BMAT!

BMA also bought 2 SAA 707-344A's (PW JT4) took them to EMA but they got sold on and scrapped I recall
we never used them in the end

they had full width leading edge flaps fitted i recall (non Standard on a 707-320/420 coal burner)

I was wondering exactly the same thing... There must be some kind of process for obtaining new logs etc.