UPS, last Airbus A380 customer, may cancel

As to Boeing being a monopoly - the feds should never have approved the Boeing Macdonnell Douglas merger when it was clear that Lockeed and others were gone from the market. But they did.

In that case McDonnel Douglas would have either had to declare bankruptcy or be acquired by Airbus. Neither of those outcomes would have been palatable to regulators in Washington DC due to the large quantity of defense contracts McDonnel Douglas had. The MD-80's were obsolete, and the MD-90 was a fiasco, so they really had nothing to compete against the A320 or 737NG. The MD-11 underperformed its promised range and fuel burn numbers. By the time McDonnel Douglas was able to meet the specifications, the A340, A330, and 777 were beating it in sales. McDonnel Douglas was finished as a civilian airliner manufacturer. The only question was whether, the civilian side of the buisiness was going to bring down the military side.

"Ah, the 727. Aircraft of choice for skydiving hijackers everywhere."

no hijackings, but saw this article the other day

DC-9 Modified for Skydiving
http://www.amtonline.com/article/article.jsp?siteSection=1&id=3473

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.