Decades of the Airliners: The 1980s

In the late 1970s, relief from strict economic regulation of cargo and passenger airlines began to take hold in the U.S. and, a little later, elsewhere. This was called “deregulation.” While prior to this it had been all but impossible to establish a new airline, under the reformed legal conditions many now chose to attempt to do this, including several people from pre-existing airlines. But out of the many “new entrant” carriers that were formed, few lasted.Early in the 1980s, a major U.S. airline went out of business, and soon there were more airline bankruptcies, although some of them were able to reorganize financially and continue to fly. New aircraft types like the MD-80 and the Boeing 737 “Classic” series appeared and came to dominate a market previously “owned” by the 727\. On the cargo front, UPS (United Parcel Service) began competing with Federal Express, and there were mergers including Delta/Western, Northwest/Republic and Piedmont/USAir. With over 250 color illustrations, _Decades of the Airliners: The 1980s_ tells the complete story of this transformative decade in airline history.