Long-legged Cranes: Lufthansa's Long Haul 720Bs

Lufthansa had only been allowed to restart flight operations in 1955, yet by 1960 it had already regained its position as one of the leading European airlines thanks to excellent levels of service, punctuality and reliability. It certainly wasn't to be left behind with jet operations either and on January 23, 1957 it made its first order for jets. These would be Boeing 707s started a long tradition of being a staunch Boeing customer.

Lufthansa's initial order was for 5 Boeing 707-430s (Rolls-Royce powered versions of the 707-320 Intercontinental). The type entered service on March 17, 1960 between Frankfurst and New York. From May 20 San Francisco began and the day after non-stop flights to Chicago. The big 707 performed well for Lufthansa but the jump in size from L-1649s to 707s was too much for many of Lufthansa's routes and the airline began to look around for an alternative.

Fortunately for Lufthansa Boeing had been developing the Boeing 720 as a smaller shorter range alternative - primarily for US Trunk airlines. The type however in its turbofan version offered only marginally less range than the larger 707 but seating 125 passengers was better suited to long thin routes operated by Lufthansa. Aer Lingus was another airline that took advantage of the 720's decent range / size mixture.

Lufthansa ordered four 720Bs on January 30, 1960 with four more added later. The first aircraft, D-ABOH (the registrations followed directly from the 707-430s) arrived in March 1961 and two more (ABOK and ABOL) were in service by May 20 when the type was deployed on South American routes. On July 1, 1961 services to the Middle East were begun and these were followed by African routes to Lagos on March 4 and Johannesburg on May 14.

Timetable from collection of Bjorn Larsson at http://www.timetableimages.com/ttimages/lh.htm

Sadly Lufthansa lost two of its 720s. The first D-ABOK was lost after only a few months on December 4, 1961 when it crashed on a training flight at Ebersheim. The second aircraft lost was D-ABOP which was only two and a half years old. Again it was a training flight that was the occasion. The aircraft took off from Frankfurt and during the course of manoeuvres undertook a complete roll. The pilots attempted a second roll but unfortunately lost control and the aircraft broke up in mid-air. A foolish and tragic loss.

Lufthansa's traffic was growing strongly during the 1960s and the airline returned to full sized 707s in October 1961 when it ordered its first 707-330Bs. By this time the Pratt and Whitney turbofans outclassed the original series 430 Rolls-Royce engines. Eventually 18 aircraft were purchased up until October 1970. With the network growing Lufthansa needed its smaller 720s less and all the remaining 6 aircraft were sold to Pan Am from March 1964 replaced by the larger 707s.

Pan Am used the Boeing 720s (along with 3 ex-American aircraft) on its Caribbean and Bahamas routes. They also saw service on South American routes like Caracas and Sao Paulo. Pan Am sold on the aircraft in late 1972 / early 1973 with two passing to Alia Royal Jordanian, one to Ariana Afghan and three to Avianca. D-ABOR was the last aircraft delivered to Lufthansa and named ‘Dortmund’. She became N788PA ‘Clipper Nonpareil’ with Pan Am and was sold to Alia in November 1972 as JY-ADT. She passed to Sierra Leone Airways in November 1983 as 9L-LAZ. By June 1985 she was stored as part of the KC-135 spares fleet registered N720BC.

References

1991. Davies R.E.G. Lufthansa: An Airline and Its Aircraft
Aviation Safety Network - D-ABOP