Wednesday, October 28, 2009

Detroit Metropolitan Airport

I was heading out to California today and this time I had a window seat which was nice. The weather wasn't terribly cooperative though.

Detroit Metropolitan Airport was started in 1930 with the company that would become American Airlines having a flight there. It also housed units of the Michigan National Guard. (One of these years I would love to get a picture of the old terminal). Between the end of World War II and the middle 50's, airport traffic was shifting over to Willow Run Airport until Pan Am started operations at then Detroit Wayne Airport. What really helped the shift was the installation of long range radar equipment causing Detroit Wayne Airport to become the first inland airport to be certified for jets.

In 1984, Republic Airlines began its hub operatons here until they merged with Northwest. At this point there were the Davey and Berry Terminals. In 2002, operations started from the McNamara Terminal. Northwest was the largest airline there, until the merger with Delta. Now Detroit is the second largest hub for Delta (after Atlanta). It's airport code is DTW.

This is the view of the other plane at the gate next to ours. I was a bit rushed to my plane otherwise I would have gotten a picture of it.

As we are pulling out of the gate.

The old terminal.

A shot of the McNamara Terminal.

the commuter terminal, mostly prop planes and Canada Regional jets.

An Airbus 319.

757

Some sort of DC-9 Variant.

Another DC-9 Variant.

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