37 years ago Northeast Airlines merged with Delta on August 1, 1971. The merger expanded our operations between New England and Florida and to Bermuda and the Bahamas, as you can see in the linked map. The merger also brought the Boeing 727, a mid-size, narrow, 3-engine jet, to Delta — the first of many in our fleet.
Here’s a rare photo of a Northeast Airlines Boeing 727 in merger markings. The 727 is in the Northeast Yellowbird paint scheme with a Delta “widget” logo added beside the front cabin door.
The 21 Boeing 727s from Northeast Airlines included -95 models, the first -200 “stretched model” to be placed into airline service (on December 14, 1967) and the 500th 727 to come off the Boeing production line. By 1981, at its peak, Delta’s 727-200 fleet numbered up to 129—the largest fleet in the world of this type of aircraft.
If anyone has a photo of a plane in Northeast/Delta merger markings that they would like to share, please let me know.
Marie Force
Archives Manager
August 2nd, 2008 at 3:16 pm
Pretty cool
August 14th, 2008 at 4:06 pm
Thanks to Dave DeBrace, of Cottage Grove Mn. for sharing these 3 examples from his photo collection of more Northeast Airlines planes in 1972 Delta merger markings:
http://blog.delta.com/wp-content/uploads/dc-9-northeast.jpg
http://blog.delta.com/wp-content/uploads/dc-9-northeast-ii.jpg
http://blog.delta.com/wp-content/uploads/727-northeast.jpg
Dave says the two photos of DC-9, N983NE were taken by Bob Garrard. The Boeing 727 N979NE photos it by Bob Polaneczky.
Marie