Anchorage-Cold Bay-St.Paul on RAA

Checked out your Electra web sight. Beautiful! Thanks for sharing it with us. I too flew the RAA Electra (mine was N9744C). I went Anchorage-Cold Bay-St. Paul-Anchorage. Eight hours on Lady Electra. Total cost: $15.00 US.

At the time(1989)I was working for Braniff 2 and there was an interline fare of $15.00 (yes...FIFTEEN bucks) for all the flying you could do on RAA. The RAA people were absolutely wonderful! What a great airline! My flight attendants name was Wendy (I wonder if she still works for RAA?) and you could not have had a more professional and fantastic person for a flight attendant!

Our flight was on the first Wednesday of the month, and that meant that it made a "flag stop" in Port Heiden on the way from Anchorage to Cold Bay. The PH runway was a sand/dirt mix -- and VERY short. What a cloud of dust when the pilot reversed those huge props!!! The runway at St. Paul Island was the same way. WHAT A GAS OF A FLIGHT.

I remember the take-off at Cold Bay. The wind was gusting up to 60 knots (enough to rock the old girl pretty well when she was parked). We taxied to the end of the runway, turned around, the pilots put the throttles forward and I swear that plane rolled maybe 300 ft and then went up like an elevator! It was wonderful. I think what really impressed me though, was the incrediblely smooth take-off from Anchorage. I had forgotten that aspect of "prop" flying. Gracefull.

In my life (I'm soon to turn 44 -- almost the same age as the Electra) I have had the supreme pleasure of riding on various different airline's Electras. Even as a very young child, this airplane intrigued me as no other had. I remember watchng my mother board a Braniff Electra at the old Kansas City Municipal Airport when I was about 5 years old (roughly 1961). I was standing at the window in the gate (this was a ground level gate) and I looked up at the Electra, which was parked at an angle to the terminal building, with the nose very close to the window. I remember thinking to myself that it was the "sad airplane" because, from that angle, the windshield of the Electra had a kind of "droop" to it that reminded me of someone with a sad expression on their face. I know it was an Electra because I also remember the big fat props with 4 blades which I thought very strange compared to the normal 3 skinney blades of the Convairs and DC6's I normally saw. I could not forget this strange airplane, even though I didn' know its name. Since that time, when I see her, l'm reminded of that day and think of her fondly as "the sad airplane", with a little smile in my heart.

Anyway, since those days I have flown many Braniff Electras (virtually every color they had) as well as many Eastern Air-Shuttle Electras. I've flown on Northwest Electras a couple of times, and one or two American. I will truely regret seeing this wonderful airplane fade away. She has always captivated me. And many others as well. Each airline put their unique "stamp" on their Electras, but underneath it all, they were simply....Electras. Simply, the best.

Thanks for letting me relive old but wonderful memories. I hope you enjoyed them too.

Chris