Metroliner flight in Australia
Posted by Mattynice75@reddit | aviation | View on Reddit | 41 comments
Love that we still have some of these planes still flying. Noisy? Yes. Headroom? Nope! But good fun? You bet! And everyone gets a window seat and a great view of the cockpit!
Abberant45@reddit
Sharp airlines flies them I believe?
Fire_Natsu@reddit
Wait these was what was used by regional airlines in US?? That imterior is claustrophobic
offgrid-wfh955@reddit
Agreed. Pilots used to joke you could tell who came off a Metro based on the temple bruises from slamming into the tube; with no yaw damper the tails wags continuously in the bumps 🤣
Hazemt3@reddit
Nice. Taking one to go to King Island in a few days. Looking forward to it
hillbilly_dan@reddit
Golf?
Hazemt3@reddit
Yes :)
hillbilly_dan@reddit
Niiiice
Dry_Complaint_3569@reddit
Happy landings ✈️
Texas_Kimchi@reddit
Metroliners give me extreme nostalgia of LAX growing up. Metroliners were everywhere.
offgrid-wfh955@reddit
San Antonio sewer pipe, tube of doom, the weed-eater, air raid siren; miss it.
GuaranteeUnhappy3342@reddit
I flew the Metro II for almost two years. We called it the “Sweatro”…if it was a warm day you were sweating and us up front were sweating more and we also called it the ”tubeliner”, and I also heard them called the Lawn Dart.
Our radios still had squelch knobs and the ADF would point to an NDB…if you were lucky enough, to all of seven miles away. Did work well enough to get Howard Stern out of NYC. But I loved the engines, how fast you got reverse. First time I flew a Beech 99 I thought they had rubber bands in the control linkage.
Epstiendidntkillself@reddit
Narco Mark 12's I'll bet.
GuaranteeUnhappy3342@reddit
1981…so probably yes!
offgrid-wfh955@reddit
Yes!, lawn dart; I forgot that one. Hadn’t heard sweatro, that is right on point. In midwest summers sometimes flew around unpressurized. Speaking of NDB’s, those were the days doing night, no radar, full approaches, stop watch in hand, looking out for deer on touchdown
GuaranteeUnhappy3342@reddit
Even that long ago we would hire guys that had never used a squelch knob. We had one crew hit a deer landing. Not pretty! Barney Rubble indeed!
We were over confident idiots and very lucky! But hand flying skills we had. First flight director I used was the Shorts 360 and first autopilot was the Brasilia mucho years later.
boredatc@reddit
death pencil; australian atc
ywgflyer@reddit
Same. I have 4000 hours on it.
Dojo588@reddit
Tight and fast. Two of my favourite things.
GuaranteeUnhappy3342@reddit
Flying VFR along the Hudson River looking up at the skyscrapers and dodging float planes going the same way like they were standing still.
tenexchamp@reddit
Air Wisconsin’s entire fleet for years!
Deafening, uncomfortable, and yet, quite the flying experience!
BigNo2360@reddit
The flying cigar 😬
barium711@reddit
Kinda reminds me of a toucan
Impressive-Yak-7449@reddit
Wow! "Death Tubes" still flying?
Thebraincellisorange@reddit
regional Australia has some really old stuff flying around.
Darrell456@reddit
Use to fly these guys single pilot. Got my type ins San Antonio and some of the guys who taught the class knew Ed Swearingin personally. It was such a cool experience.
roy-dam-mercer@reddit
Was the head of the program there named Dick? From Air Wisconsin? My memory is fuzzy. That was 28 years ago.
My longest single pilot flight was a repo from the hill country to Atlantic City in the springtime. Line of storms over Appalachia, so I had to deviate over Atlanta. Made it non-stop, but I was very happy I didn’t have to do that trip more than once. Dispatch was very happy they didn’t have to send a co-pilot.
Darrell456@reddit
You know, I was just thinking it's been since 2012 and I don't remember. I just remember those guys knew every nut and bolt on the plane. Ground school was amazing. I did the 1900 type a year or so after that and that was a complete waste of time. They were just reading power points to me in class.
What I really learned about the Metro was it was just a hodge hodge of different aircraft put together. Just a total mess. But it was fun to fly. Fuckin dangerous, but fun.
Gremlin0@reddit
Got 571 hours. Came out of college with 1100 TT directly into the right seat. The plane seemed enormous but not as large as the Saab 340. 😜
Imaginary-Spray3711@reddit
I flew Metro IIs that were equipped with JATO bottles. If you lost an engine on takeoff, you would fire the bottles so the rescue crews could follow the smoke trail to the crash site.
mz_groups@reddit
Even if not fired, how often did those need to be checked out/replaced?
Turbulent_Wash_9150@reddit
Metroliner and Saab 340 are my favs for whatever reason
CelendilAU@reddit
If you get to visit Brisbane in the few years before Rex has to retire the 340, you’ll see quite a few. Though as far as I know all the Metroliners are converted small cargo these days, not passenger.
boredatc@reddit
broome has CasAir or similar company: NGX and KGX from memory. Pax charter
vhqpa@reddit
Nice I was supposed to fly on the Metroliner several years ago when Brindabella Airlines was around. But there was a last minute swap to the Jetstream J41.
SuperFriendlyAv8or@reddit
Wow, several years ago indeed, they went under in 2013! I worked for a regional J41 operator in the UK at the time and we purchased a couple of Brindabella's for spare parts. When they arrived it turned out that some of the components weren't compatible with our Jetstreams, so they ended up sitting on the ramp for years
lightlyskipping@reddit
I flew on one from Launceston to Flinders Island, was an exciting ride.
MrGnu@reddit
Great nose!
Lazygit1965@reddit
That looks snug in there.
BandicootNecessary26@reddit
I remember Ameriflight used to fly MadMax Metros when I worked line at OAK. They were covered in dirt and exhaust and half of their avionics were always INOP lol. The pilots would describe the horror of trying to land them with only ADF as everything else wasn't working lol.
PristineMountain1644@reddit
Cool! Still missing the cigar as well as FlyPelican’s Jetstream 32.
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