Did Ryanair have A320's?

David086

Saw this in a eurovision video for opening in 1988:

donkey balls

Nope they never had a bus back then it was the aul BAC 1 11 or 737 200 with those noisy CFM 200 engines open to correction on engine number they were louder than the aul 727 F with the hush kit built on.
I'm showing my age but some of them wear painted in the old Eircell colours(now vodafone) and others in the Kilkenny beer colours.
At one stage they had ex Romanian air force guys fly planes for them.

wittymoniker

ryanair ran eirjet 320s for a short while a few years ago, and the 1-11 had spey engines, the 737-200 had p&w jt8d-15/17 engines, no sound like it!

iPlop

David086 wrote: »

Saw this in a eurovision video for opening in 1988:

Was that the video with Johnny Logan on the plane? I remember the video but never realised it was a A320, good catch OP.

Jim236

They ordered 4 A320s in the early 90's under then CEO Eugene O'Neill but the order was cancelled when they ran into financial troubles and the company had to be restructured.

CaptainSkidmark

Jim236 wrote: »

They ordered 4 A320s in the early 90's under then CEO Eugene O'Neill but the order was cancelled when they ran into financial troubles and the company had to be restructured.

And restructured it was lol:D

Nforce

Yep...the 1-11's were licence built in Romania by Rombac (500 series?). I was at an airshow in EIAB where one did a few low passes along the runway. I was (un)fortunate to be allowed access to the runway edge and the noise of those Spey's will stay with me forever! :cool:

Edit: Showing my age,but I can remember when they flew an Embraer Bandeirante and also when they had a Shorts Sunderland flying boat in Ryanair livery (not fleet operational,though).

iPlop

Nforce wrote: »

Yep...the 1-11's were licence built in Romania by Rombac (500 series?). I was at an airshow in EIAB where one did a few low passes along the runway. I was (un)fortunate to be allowed access to the runway edge and the noise of those Spey's will stay with me forever! :cool:

The 1-11 is the loudest passenger jet I've ever heard ,the rumble is unreal even when it's high up.They used to be at 7,000-10,000 feet passing over my house after taking off from Dub and the noise was still very loud.

Great though:D

Tenger

Jim236 wrote: »

They ordered 4 A320s in the early 90's under then CEO Eugene O'Neill but the order was cancelled when they ran into financial troubles and the company had to be restructured.

Yep. Airbus painted FR titles on their publicity A320-100 and it even visited DUB. If you get a glimpse of the rest of it the aircraft was in Airbus house colours. I saw a pic many moons ago of it with a jetway along Pier B!!

David086

You see her at 2:10 and again at 2:52.

Here's the bit with the house colours.

EchoIndia

Here is the demo aircraft when it visited Dublin - unfortunately on a very wet and dark day:

http://www.worldairpics.com/photo/1003447/M/Airbus-A320-111/F-WWDC/Airbus-Industrie-AIB/

bladeruner

wittymoniker wrote: »

the 737-200 had p&w jt8d-15/17 engines, no sound like it!

Close your eyes and you could be flying Concorde !

roundymac

bladeruner wrote: »

Close your eyes and you could be flying Concorde !

British Airways Tridents on the Corl heathrow route were the noisest I ever heard in Cork.

TheAnswer

EchoIndia wrote: »

Here is the demo aircraft when it visited Dublin - unfortunately on a very wet and dark day:

http://www.worldairpics.com/photo/1003447/M/Airbus-A320-111/F-WWDC/Airbus-Industrie-AIB/

And not a winglet in sight!

RadioRetro

roundymac wrote: »

British Airways Tridents on the Corl heathrow route were the noisest I ever heard in Cork.

Agreed (although they were BEA when I travelled in them). 1-11's were a close second though.

roundymac

RadioRetro wrote: »

Agreed (although they were BEA when I travelled in them). 1-11's were a close second though.

Your must be older than me so.:D:p:)

The Baltimore Sun

donkey balls wrote: »

Nope they never had a bus back then it was the aul BAC 1 11 or 737 200 with those noisy CFM 200 engines open to correction on engine number they were louder than the aul 727 F with the hush kit built on.
I'm showing my age but some of them wear painted in the old Eircell colours(now vodafone) and others in the Kilkenny beer colours.
At one stage they had ex Romanian air force guys fly planes for them.

As far as i know....this was the first A320 ever in Ireland!
It was a trial period for Ryanair and they eventually gave it back to Airbus (after flaunting it around for a bit during the Eurovision days).
The B737-200s (21 in total) had Pratt & Whitney JT8d-15 and -17 engines. Very noisy even with the hush kits!

xper

The Incredible Fridge wrote: »

Was that the video with Johnny Logan on the plane? I remember the video but never realised it was a A320, good catch OP.

As you can see from the video posted above, it does indeed appear in the opening sequence which runs into Mr. Eurovision's performance.

But the reason the aicraft features at all is that it is also used more extensively in one of the 'interval' pieces which was basically a video for one of Hot House Flowers' first singles, Don't Go, and features the band hopping around various European cities busking in some sort of Euro love-in theme (I think I recall Terry Wogan making some sort of sceptical remark about European unity). It's no Riverdance but it was a fine stroke (strokes not involving politicians can actually be good!) to give a then unknown band and an unknown airline a long free ad across Europe. Hot House Flowers did have a hit off the back of it and it essentially launched them overseas. They did far better out of that Eurovision than any of the competing songs. Ryanair have had some success since then too but at that stage they were still very much Irish based and flying second hand jets, certainly no brnad new A320's - they just slapped a couple of stickers on the Airbus test aircraft.

* All subject to falible memory (I'm frightened by how much I dragged up!) but I think that's pretty much it.

roundymac

Edit: Showing my age,but I can remember when they flew an Embraer Bandeirante and also when they had a Shorts Sunderland flying boat in Ryanair livery (not fleet operational,though
I think they also operated an HS 748 and an ATR42 at the atart as well.

Killinator

EchoIndia wrote: »

Here is the demo aircraft when it visited Dublin - unfortunately on a very wet and dark day:

http://www.worldairpics.com/photo/1003447/M/Airbus-A320-111/F-WWDC/Airbus-Industrie-AIB/

Theres an Airbus in that shot?
I was too busy looking at the lovely green lump with a shamrock on it:D

lord lucan

Killinator wrote: »

Theres an Airbus in that shot?
I was too busy looking at the lovely green lump with a shamrock on it:D

Funnily enough i was the same,the 747 looks fab. FR even forgoing the use of the airbridge back then too.:pac:

Nforce

roundymac wrote: »

I think they also operated an HS 748 and an ATR42 at the atart as well.

And a Convair 580 too