US
CONVAIRLINERS - 1970s A selection of my photographs of Convairs seen in USA in 1970s |
View from the First Officer's
seat on Mackey International Airlines Convair 440 N446JM inbound to Miami
from Bahamas.
All Convairliner models were powered by two P&W R-2800 Double Wasp radial engines |
Original model CV-240 N24927
at Lancaster, California in September 1977 stored for a proposed Antelope
Valley Air Museum. It and the executive Douglas A-20 behind were both Howard Hughes aircraft, parked in the open at Culver City for two decades |
CV-240 N777DC with extended
weather radar nose and corporate paint scheme. Fort Lauderdale, Florida
in October 1977
|
Another corporate
CV-240 N1002S at Ft Lauderdale in October 1977, with a thimble nose weather
radome |
CV-340 N4818C at Ontario,
California in September 1979 operating a Dow Jones nightly financial courier
service |
CV-340 N1179 at Fort Lauderdale in October
1979. International Field Studies was an educational organisation which
used a number of propliners at that time to carry students to remote locations |
Convair
CV-340 N477KW of Air Sunshine, at Miami Florida in October 1979.
The airline used the "KW" registration suffix on its Convairs and DC-3s in recognition its major port, Key West, Florida |
CV-440 N446JM
of Mackey International Airlines at Treasure Cay, Bahamas in Octonber
1977.
Mackey had a long history of airline services between Florida ports and Bahamas islands with DC-6s and Convairs |
Mackey
International was taken over in 1979 by Sunny South Air Services, and continued
with a new paint scheme. CV-440 N444JM seen ariving at Mackey's Fort Lauderdale ramp in October 1979 |
N900WC was one of several CV-580s introduced
to the Mackey fleet in 1979 when Willian Cousens of Sunny South Air Services
took over the airline. Seen at Ft Lauderdale October 1979, this was formerly Australian CV-340 VH-BZD of Ansett Airlines |
CV-580 N9012J in another variation of the
Mackey International Airways scheme, at Fort Lauderdale in Opctober 1979 |
Sea Airmotive Inc at Anchorage in September
1979 operated a mixed fleet of floatplanes, Convair 580s and Caribous
to remote
Alaskan communities. Their ex Allegheny Airlines CV-580 N5805 was parked on the sloping ramp to Lake Hood |
This immaculate
CV-580 N5126 at Miami in October 1979 was part of the corporate fleet
of General Motors Corp at Detroit
|
CV-600 N129AJ
was a windowless freighter for Midwest Air Express, operating on charter
to Airborne Charter Express.
Photographed at Wilmington, Ohio in September 1979 after its nightly freight schedule |
Rows
of retired Texas International CV-600s stored at Ryan Field, near Tucson
Arizona in October 1977 |
Until
the mid 1970s, surviving Convairs were mostly former airline aircraft,
with only a few military-surplus T-29s and C-131s.
However from 1976 the remaining stocks of USAF and USN Convairs were released for civil disposal. Large numbers of ex military Convairs were ferried from the Davis Monthan AFB storage grounds in Arizona to maintenance companies for civil certification, with hand-painted N numbers applied over the roughly obliterated military markings. Here's a selection of those I came across: |
VT-29D N74798 was one of many ex-military
Convairs waiting for civil conversion at Tucson, Arizona in October 1979. They were on the parking ramp of Hamilton Aircraft Co which had been in the heavy aircraft maintenance business for decades |
Former USAF T-29B
N64797 had made the short flight to Tucson from nearby Davis Monthan Air
Force Base |
US Navy T-29B
had been allocated civil registration N99383. Tucson October 1977. Note the training position housings along the fuselage roof |
T-29A N87949 was at Tucson in October
1977 on the Hamilton Aircraft ramp |
Retired USAF
T-29A with hand-painted civil registration N64798 at Tucson, October 1977 |
T-29C N23024
was with a group of disposals Convairs stored at Miami Airport in October
1979 |
T-29B N9618A
at Fort Lauderdale, Florida in October 1979 |
USAF T-29D bombardier
trainer for 6 trainees with windows faired over, as N8041T at Fort Lauderdale
in October 1979 |
This former T-29B
N92937 navigation trainer was an early civil conversion. Seen at Fort Lauderdale
in October 1977 |
Yakutat Seafoods' Convair
T-29B N64725 at Anchorage, Alaska in September 1979 retained its basic USAF
paintwork |
More Convair pictures can be found in this series in DETROIT-WILLOW RUN and PROPLINER FLIGHTS |