Han Maenen wrote: >Indeed, Airbus did not exist yet in 1962 The Caravelle jet was built by a >French aircraft builder, but I do not know its name. I read the >1964 edition >of the Etude Critique, and there the Caravelle and the way it was developed >and built was mentioned.
The manufacturer was Sud Aviation. In the U.S., United Airlines was, I think, the only customer for the Caravelle. Air France, of course, had a large number of them. The Caravelle's major flaw was not airframe related. For some reason, the engines had a tendency to cut out in flight. Like the MD-80 (now called the Boeing 717), it had twin rear jets. There were quite a few cases of one engine failing. There was one case of both engines failing. However the pilot managed to restart them. Apart from the interesting shape of its stabilizer, it had odd windows -- triangular (equilateral, slightly rounded, with rounded corners, apex up). That's all from my memory of contemporaneous news reports and photographs, so I'm really dating myself. Bill Potts, CMS Roseville, CA http://metric1.org [SI Navigator]
