I spent the weekend going through some old photos, I thought that you may be interested to see some pictures I took at Heathrow during the latter half of the 1980s.
I was living in the Midlands at the time, but my annual visit was always a highlight of my year. This was still in the days of Pan Am and Trans World at the airport, and in this 1989 photo Clipper Empress of the Skies is on her way to the runway:-
N9670 by IndiaEcho Photography, on Flickr
How I miss the fantastically evocative names of the Pan Am 747 fleet!
Another 747 operator was Varig, who operated the -300 variant between Heathrow and Brazil. The flight continued onto Copenhagen, which is where PP-VOA was bound for:-
PP-VOA by IndiaEcho Photography, on Flickr
The BA 747-400s are commonplace at Heathrow these days, but G-BNLB was one of the highlights of my 1989 visit, having just been delivered. Here she is crossing the runway on her way from Terminal 4 to start a flight to Philadelphia and Pittsburgh:-
G-BNLB by IndiaEcho Photography, on Flickr
My 1988 visit was particularly interesting as there was a problem with the ATC system in the morning. As a consequence, Air France and KLM both used 747s on later flights, with the evening Lufthansa flight from Frankfurt being operated by DC-10 D-ADLO:-
D-ADLO by IndiaEcho Photography, on Flickr
BA also sent a 747 to Paris.
European widebodies were frequent visitors, though, with the A.300 being operated by several airlines, including SX-BEF from Olympic:-
SX-BEF by IndiaEcho Photography, on Flickr
Narrowbodied types visiting the airport included, as they still do, SAS MD-80s, although the attractive livery of the 1980s has been replaced by something rather duller:-
OY-KGT by IndiaEcho Photography, on Flickr
The Eastern European airlines were always interesting - the Airbus and Boeing fleets we are now used to were unthinkable then, with Russian built equipment being used such as Tu-154 CCCP-85293:-
CCCP-85293 by IndiaEcho Photography, on Flickr
Bangladesh Biman have just started 777 services to Heathrow, replacing their DC-10s. When this photo was taken, the DC-10s were just coming into service, replacing the 707:-
S2-ACE by IndiaEcho Photography, on Flickr
Biz Jets were much more frequent back in the 80s than now, and former airliners operating in such a role were also regular visitors. Here is Qatari Government 727 A7-AAB, at a time when Qatar Airways hadn't been thought of and aircraft from the country were rare:-
A7-AAB by IndiaEcho Photography, on Flickr
To end, I'll return to the 747. I believe that at the time something like 10% of the global 747 fleet visited Heathrow each day. A small number were 747SPs, with South African regularly sending the short bodied variant to the airport:-
ZS-SPE by IndiaEcho Photography, on Flickr
I hope the photos are of interest - more are at http://www.flickr.com/photos/indiaecho/
Neil
