Braniff International Airways becomes the only American airline to operate the Concorde as two Braniff pilots land an Air France and a British AirwaysConcorde simultaneously on parallel runways at Dallas-Fort Worth Regional Airport after flying from Washington Dulles International Airport in Virginia outside Washington, D.C., ceremonially inaugurating a new interchange service allowing the Concorde to operate over the United States. The service functions by having Air France and British Airways crews fly the aircraft from Europe to Washington Dulles, where the aircraft are temporarily leased and re-registered to Braniff and flown by Braniff crews as Braniff aircraft to Dallas-Fort Worth. The process is reversed on the return trip, with Braniff crews flying the planes as Braniff aircraft to Washington Dulles, where they are "sold" back and re-registered to Air France and British Airways before being flown back to Europe by French and British crews. Braniff begins revenue service with the Concorde between Dallas-Fort Worth and Washington Dulles on January 13, charging 10 percent more than it charges for first class on its Boeing 727s flying the route.[4]
February 19 – American former child actor Norman Ollestad Sr. dies instantly when the charteredCessna 172 he is riding in crashes in California's San Bernardino Mountains in adverse weather at an altitude of 7,300 feet (2,200 meters). The pilot dies soon afterwards. The two survivors, Ollestad's girlfriend and his 11-year-old son, future author Norman Ollestad Jr., attempt to descend the mountain. She dies in a fall, but the younger Ollestad survives.[13]
February 26 – Production of the A-4 Skyhawk ends after 26 years, with the delivery of the 2,690th and final aircraft to the United States Marine Corps.
February 27 – Four hijackers commandeer Aeroflot Flight 212 – a Tupolev Tu-154 with 34 people on board – shortly after it takes off from Oslo, Norway, for a flight to Stockholm, Sweden. They threaten to blow up the airliner with glass bottles filled with kerosene. The plane lands at Stockholm, where the crew overpowers the hijackers.[14]
A CAACHawker Siddeley HS-121 Trident 2E (registration B-274) on a training flight crashes into a factory in Beijing, China, during its initial climb after takeoff from Beijing Xijiao Airport, killing all 12 people on the plane and at least 32 people on the ground, although some sources estimate that up to 200 people are killed.[16][17]
March 17 – After receiving a false warning of a fire in its No. 1 engine shortly after takeoff from Vnukovo Airport in Moscow, an overloaded AeroflotTupolev Tu-104B (registration CCCP-42444) flown by an inexperienced pilot attempts to return to the airport. On approach, the airliner strikes a power linetransmission tower, bounces off a hill, passes over a highway, and crashes in a frozen ploughed field, its wings and cockpit separating from its fuselage. The crash kills 58 of the 119 people on board.[20]
March 25 – Qantas retires its last Boeing 707 and becomes the world's first airline with a fleet made up exclusively of Boeing 747s.
A man takes a woman hostage at knifepoint at a security screening point at Sydney Airport in Sydney, Australia, and takes her with him as he forces his away aboard Pan American World Airways Flight 816, a Boeing 747SP-21 (registration N530PA) preparing for a flight to Auckland, New Zealand. He demands to be flown via Singapore to Rome – where he wishes to speak to the Pope and to an Italian Communist leader – and then on to Moscow. Police forcefully rescue the hostage, after which the hijacker produces two beer cans with wicks in them, one of which he holds in one hand; holding one of them in one hand and a match in the other hand, he threatens to blow up the plane. The police use a high-pressure fire hose to knock him off balance and when he ducks behind a seat with one of the beer cans, they shoot him. He later dies of his wounds. The beer cans are found to contain gunpowder.[23]
April 23 – SAETA Flight 11, a Vickers 785D Viscount (registration HC-AVP) disappears during a domestic flight in Ecuador from Quito to Cuenca with the loss of all 57 people on board. The plane's wreckage will be discovered in 1984 at a location 25 nautical miles (29 miles; 46 kilometers) off course on high ground in Ecuador's Pastaza Province.[24]
June 6 – In the wake of the May 25 crash of American Airlines Flight 191, the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration revokes the Douglas DC-10's type certificate, grounding all DC-10s pending modifications to their slat actuation and position systems and stall warning and power supply changes. Until July 13, all U.S. DC-10s will remain grounded and foreign DC-10s will be prohibited from operating in the United States.
June 8 – Apparently wanting to be flown to the United States to see his estranged wife and children, 36-year-old seaman Phillip Sillery enters the cockpit of a Trans Australia AirlinesDouglas DC-9-31 armed with a sawn-off 12-gauge shotgun and hijacks the airliner during a domestic flight in Australia from Coolangatta to Brisbane. After the plane lands at Brisbane's Eagle Farm Airport, Sillery allows all the passengers to disembark. As he holds the shotgun to the captain′s head, a stewardess knocks him off balance, allowing the co-pilot to grab him. The crew then overpowers Sillery, who is arrested.[30][31]
June 11
A United States Forest ServiceDouglas C-47A-90-DL Skytrain carrying personnel, two dogs, and 3,100 pounds (1,400 kg) of equipment to the Moose Creek Ranger Station on Idaho's Selway River suffers the failure of its left engine, after which its right engine catches fire, explodes, and detaches from the aircraft. The C-47 glides to a crash-landing in which it strikes a tree and lands in a river in a narrow canyon at an altitude of 2,000 feet (610 meters). Nine of the 12 people on board die immediately, and one of three survivors succumbs to his injuries before reaching a hospital.[32]
June 23 – The Tupolev Tu-144 supersonic transport, withdrawn from passenger service in June 1978, re-enters service, with the longer-range Tu-144D model beginning Aeroflot cargo-only domestic flights in the Soviet Union between Moscow and Khabarovsk.
June 30 – Wanting to return to Cuba to join the revolution of Fidel Castro after living in Puerto Rico and armed with a bottle, 46-year-old Cuban exile Igoberto Gonzalez Sanchez hijacksEastern Airlines Flight 932, a Lockheed L-1011 Tristar with 306 people on board flying from San Juan, Puerto Rico, to Miami, Florida. Crew members and passengers subdue him, and he is arrested after the airliner arrives at Miami.[36][37]
Western Airlines Flight 44, a Boeing 737-200, mistakenly lands at Buffalo, Wyoming, instead of its intended destination, which is Sheridan, Wyoming. No one is injured, and the only damage is to the tarmac at the airport, which was not designed to support the weight of the jetliner. The incident prompts a legal battle and subsequent landmark aviation ruling in Ferguson v. NTSB in June 1982.[41]
August 22 – A hijacker takes control of United Air Lines Flight 739 – a Boeing 727 with 120 people on board – during a flight from Portland, Oregon, to Los Angeles, California. The plane diverts to San Francisco, California, then returns to Portland, where the hijacker surrenders.[47]
August 24
During a domestic flight in the Soviet Union from Norilsk to Krasnoyarsk, all four engines of an Aeroflot Antonov An-12TB (registration CCCP-12963) flame out. The crew attempts to reach Yeniseysk Airport in Yeniseysk, but has to make a forced landing on a wooded hillside 18 kilometers (11 miles) from Yeniseysk. The airliner bursts into flames, and 11 of the 16 people on board die.[48]
August 29 – When a crew member inadvertently extends a flap while an Aeroflot Tupolev Tu-124V (registration CCCP-45038) cruises at 27,000 feet (8,200 meters) during a flight from Kyiv in the Soviet Union's Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic to Kazan in the Russian Soviet Federated Socialist Republic, the airliner goes into a spin. It disintegrates at an altitude of 3,000 meters (9,800 feet) and crashes near Kirsanov, killing all 63 people on board.[50]
September 7 – Three members of the "Imam Sadr Movement" hijack an AlitaliaDouglas DC-8-62H (registration I-DIWW) with 183 people on board during a flight from Beirut, Lebanon, to Rome, Italy. They demand information on the 31 August 1978 disappearance of Mousa Sadr in Libya. They release the passengers at Rome, then force the airliner to fly to Tehran, Iran, where they surrender after a statement they wrote is broadcast on radio and television.[53][54]
September 12 – A man armed with what appears to be a pistol hijacks a LufthansaBoeing 727-230 during a domestic flight in West Germany from Frankfurt-am-Main to Cologne. He demands a meeting with Chancellor of GermanyHelmut Schmidt in the presence of the news media. Seven hours of negotiations ensue after the plane lands at Cologne; the hijacker then reads a message to political leaders calling for a more humane world before releasing the passengers and four of the seven crew members. After several more hours of negotiations, he releases the rest of the crew and surrenders. His weapons turns out to be a toy pistol.[55]
A hijacker claiming to have a bomb commandeers Pacific Southwest Airlines Flight 784 – a Boeing 727 with 108 people on board flying from Los Angeles to San Diego, California – demanding to be flown to Mexico. The airliner diverts to Tijuana, Mexico, where the hijacker surrenders.[60]
November 24 – A hijacker commandeers American Airlines Flight 395 – a Boeing 727 with 74 people on board flying from San Antonio to El Paso, Texas – and demands to be flown to Iran. Police storm the airliner and arrest the hijacker at El Paso.[66]
^Brogan, Patrick, The Fighting Never Stopped: A Comprehensive Guide to Global Conflict Since 1945, New York: Vintage Books, 1990, ISBN0-679-72033-2, p. 111.
^ abCordesman, Anthony H., and Abraham R. Wagner, The Lessons of Modern War, Volume II: The Iran-Iraq War, Boulder, Colorado: Westview Press, 1990, ISBN0-8133-1330-9, p. 34.
^Cordesman, Anthony H., and Abraham R. Wagner, The Lessons of Modern War, Volume II: The Iran-Iraq War, Boulder, Colorado: Westview Press, 1990, ISBN0-8133-1330-9, p. 27.
^Cordesman, Anthony H., and Abraham R. Wagner, The Lessons of Modern War, Volume II: The Iran-Iraq War, Boulder, Colorado: Westview Press, 1990, ISBN0-8133-1330-9, p. 66.
