Wednesday, March 16, 2005

1960s Era Turboprop

A CBC story on an air crash near Varendei, Russia terms the Antonov-24 "a 1960s-era turboprop." While that's true, I've flown a 1960's era turboprop and I think our passengers would not have been so pleased about the airplane if we'd called it that. I think the average reader will come away from reading that "hundreds of the Soviet-designed aircraft are in service in Russia and the former Soviet republics," with the idea that operating airplanes of that age is a dangerous practice unique to impoverished areas of the world. There are a lot of good airplanes of that vintage operating in Canada. The shape of airplanes has changed a bit with fashion, but the 1960s-style fin on an airplane isn't as distinctive as the ones on a car.

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