United Air
Lines Boeing 747-122 N4728U
(c/n 19925)
Despite the fact that United were not awarded
an overseas route until 1983 (they lost out on the
Transpacific
Case in the late 1960s) they nevertheless ordered 20 Boeing 747s
primarily for the
Hawaiian routes. The move turned out to be somewhat
precipitous (load factors did not warrant
the "jumbo" on
domestic schedules) and UAL lost $46M in 1970. The above nice
shot by Bob
Garrard
shows a series 100 all decked out in "Friend
Ship" livery touching down at
Miami Inter-
national in Feb
of 1974. In the early 1990s, to boost capacity,
United acquired half a dozen or
so model
200s from QANTAS. The aircraft below, seen in this Frank C.
Duarte Jr shot at LAX
in December
1992, was ex VH-EBO.
Boeing 747-238B
N164UA (c/n 21657)