Are you the owner of this jetliner? If so, please move it immediately

[Gyrofrog]

My son wants me to book our Spring Break trip so that we can fly on a Super 80 (and/or a 757), while they’re still around.

@joey_bladb

a bankrupt airline called SpanAir

They served a mean cup of hot chocolate.

@joey_bladb

if you increase the angle of attack of the aircraft beyond a certain point, the turbulence created by the wings can interrupt engine operations

IIRC, they found out the hard way with the 727 – which BTW was louder in back than the Super 80. (I never flew on a BAC-111, which I’m told was extremely loud, at least from the outside)

[DanS]

Very likely the ownership structure became messy at the time the last owner/lessor went bust. Maintenance docs, manuals, etc. may have been misplaced, too (which are essential to determine value). Wading into this mess sounds cumbersome and expensive. Now it makes total sense for any interested party to wait until the aircraft is publicly auctioned off. This means they can acquire a clean legal title w/o having to spend a small fortune just for legal.

[joey_bladb]

@Gyrofrog

My son wants me to book our Spring Break trip so that we can fly on a Super 80 (and/or a 757), while they’re still around.

My son’s an AVGeek too. We flew down to L.A. for no good reason, right after Alaska purchased Virgin America, but before they converted the cabins and livery to AS. Purple mood lighting is pretty interesting. I thought all they needed was a fog machine, and surprise, when they spooled up the Airbus air-cycle-machine packs, it created a dense fog in the cabin for about 20 seconds (I’ve seen Airbus ACMs fog up a couple of other times).

Another interesting factoid: the last of the DC-9 based airplanes was the MD-95, which, when MD and Boeing merged, became the Boeing 717. (“717” was originally the model number for the KC-135, a modified 707 used as a military refueling aircraft).

[Sqyntz]

Pron-air?

-note to self, bad name for an airline.

[DukeTrout]

@pesco

In 1990, the airplane flew for the first time for Iberia, according to online magazine Preferente.com. Eighteen years later it was acquired by Pronair, a charter airline headquartered in Albacete in Castilla-La Mancha. But the airline, which at one point was flying regularly to China, closed down in just a year due to the increase in fuel prices and the 2008 financial crisis.

Two years later, the plane was acquired by Saicus Air, a Spanish airline based in Las Palmas in the Canary Islands. The airline operated two airplanes from Madrid and up until that point, had been dedicated to transporting cargo. The plane was meant to fly passengers between Spain and the Republic of Guinea Bissau in west Africa. But it never flew for Saicus Air. Instead it was rented to third parties along with a cabin crew. Saicus Air bought the plan in July 2010, and in December of that same year, it too had gone bankrupt.

From that description, I’m guessing the plane’s call sign is “albatross.”

[AlexG55]

Yes, it’s excellent.

[LutherBlisset]

@Faffenreffer

Now where did I put those keys?

Makes me wonder: do airliners have keys, and if so, how do they look and who keeps them?

[Gyrofrog]

@joey_bladb

(“717” was originally the model number for the KC-135, a modified 707 used as a military refueling aircraft)

I’ve seen a photo of one civilian (i.e., non-military) 717, presumably built for the USAF (as a KC-135) but delivered to the FAA instead. (info on registration here but it doesn’t quite correspond with the dates in the book I read)