Profiles and Logos
The Vickers Armstrong VC10 was a mid sized narrow body, long range airliner. The aircraft was designed to fly long routes from short runways and have excellent hot and high performance which necessitated powerful engines. In the 1950s BOAC operated Boeing 707s but these were underpowered and required long runways, not available in Africa so Vickers designed the VC10 to BOACs requirements. The first prototype flew on 29th June 1962 and was delivered to BOAC with its first revenue flight on 29th April 1964. The aircraft was very popular with both passengers and crew, it was also very fast, it still holds the record for the fastest crossing of the Atlantic for a sub-sonic airliner at 5 hours 1 min.
Although only 54 aircraft were built, they were operated around the world and by the Royal Air Force as airborne tankers and transports. The last flight was flown by ZA147 an RAF tanker on 25th September 2013.