BAe 146 / RJ Profiles and Logos

Profiles and Logos

The British Aerospace BAe146 is Britain’s most successful jet transport to date with 387 aircraft produced. The BAe 146 is a high wing four engined aircraft with a T-tail. The aircraft was designed as a short-haul regional jetliner intended to operate into small restricted airports and is renowned for its short field and quiet performance and has thus been used in many small city based airport and was the first jet aircraft certified to operate into London City Airport. Development of the aircraft started in 1973 by Hawker Siddeley as the HS146, a 70 seat regional jet to fill a gap between the turboprop HS748 and small jets such as the BAC One-Eleven and Boeing 737. Four engines were selected over two due to the unavailability of a 13,000lb class high bypass turbofan, instead using four 6,500 lbf Avco Lycoming ALF 502’s. The project was suspended in 1974 due to the economic downturn due to the oil crisis.

The project was restarted in 1978 by British Aerospace the successor to Hawker Siddeley and the first flight of the BAe146, a -100 model was on 3rd September 1981 with entry into service by Dan Air in May 1983. There are three main versions of the 146, the base model is the 70 to 94 seat -100, the 2.41m (7ft 11in) long -200 seats up to 112 passengers. The larger -300 seats up to 128 passengers.