at no charge. The aircraft were adorned
with Eastern’s two-tone blue cheatline and
delivered in late 1977, entering service up
and down the Eastern Seaboard between
the densely populated northeast (New York,
Boston, Philadelphia) and Florida (Miami,
Orlando, Fort Lauderdale, Tampa). At
the end of the trial period, the verdict was
in – the A300 was a perfect t for Eastern,
burning less than two-thirds as much fuel
as a Lockheed L-1011 TriStar, with the
comfortable 2-4-2 seating proving popular
with passengers.
On April 6, 1978, Borman bought the four
already in operation, plus 19 more to make
an initial order of 23, with an additional 11
later added brining the eet to 34.
With the Airbus project now showing
signs of becoming a real success, Britain
was keen to rejoin the consortium as a full
member. France and West Germany insisted
that a British airline buy A300s as part of
the reunion, and so low-cost pioneer Laker
Airways stepped up to buy ten aircraft. The
deal for Britain to take a 20% share (reducing
West Germany and France to 37.9% each,
with Spain still retaining it’s 4.2% share) was
struck on November 28 and implemented on
January 1, 1979. The Laker purchase was
nalised on April 10, 1979.
With the economics of the widebody
twin now rmly established, Airbus foundwidespread acceptance and the orders
came rolling in. A300s became a familiar
sight at airports around the world, most
notably in Asia where large eets were
operated by Philippine Airlines, Thai
Airways, Malaysia Airlines, Japan Air System
(previously known as Toa Domestic, or TDA),
Garuda Indonesia, Trans Australia Airlines,
Pakistan International Airlines and China
Airlines of Taiwan.
Pan Am became the second customer
in the US with an order for 13. In hindsight,
the airline was already well established on
a death spiral that ended with bankruptcyin 1991, but at the time it was a blue-chip
customer and represented a signi cant
milestone in acceptance for Airbus in the
airline world. “It’s an important win for
Airbus”, Robert Kugel, an analyst with
Morgan Stanley told The New York Times
when the order was signed on September
13, 1984. “It says conclusively that they will
be a serious competitor in the future, along
with Boeing and McDonnell Douglas.”NEXT GENERATION
With sales of its widebody twin now
nearing 250, Airbus Industrie re nedA PILOT’S VIEW
The A300 has long had a solid reputation among
crew. Pilot Captain Mark Richardson told Aviation
News: “The A300 is a very nice jet to y. It wasn’t
hard to learn the systems or to y.
“The aircraft is overpowered and has great
handling characteristics. I would improve the
aircraft by having a more aerodynamic wing,
greater wing sweep, so as to improve the cruise
speed, and update the avionics. I’ve own the
A300 at heavy weights into short air elds and up
to 38,000ft and the aircraft operates like a dream.
It handles like a sports car. It’s very responsive
and can be own with ngertips. I actually love
hand- ying this jet. I’ve own a number of jets
and next to the Falcon 50 and 900, the A300 is
one of my favourites.”http://www.aviation-news.co.uk 69Airbus A300B4, AP-BCJ, was bought second-hand from Singapore Airlines in 1985, and today resides beneath the waters
of the Persian Gulf off Dubai as an attraction for scuba divers. Pakistan International Airlines ew 11 A300B4s between
1980 and 2005, with an additional ve on short leases to provide extra capacity at peak times. Key-Alan WarnesAbove: In the mid-1970s Airbus was struggling to make a sale, especially in the USA. The
manufacturer loaned Eastern Airlines four unsold machines for free in December 1977; the
A300 was such a hit that Eastern bought the four and in total another 31. AirTeamImages.com/
Carl Ford
Below: Seven A300B4s served Spanish carrier Iberia on short-haul high-traffic routes including
Madrid to Barcelona, London, Paris and Rome. Key Collection66-71_a300DC.mf.indd 69 03/02/2017 17:47