Boeing 727-100 —

The turnaround time between the arrival of the Eastern flight from Miami and its departure to continue on to Toronto was extremely short. Passengers deplaning at Buffalo got off (which took only a few brief minutes - so brief that the starboard engine on the Electras wasn't even shut down), and the aircraft immediately buttoned up and departed. The brief stopover left no time for me to ask the Eastern gate agent if I could go out on the ramp. However, all I had to do was hang around for a couple more hours. Toronto is just across Lake Erie from Buffalo, so it was only a couple of hours before that same Eastern airliner returned to GBIA (KBUF) on its way back to Miami. And, THIS time, the Canadian passengers who had boarded at Toronto and were flying to Miami ... had to clear US Customs in Buffalo (first port of entry). Usually, that was done without the passengers having to get off, but the process took a few minutes so the engines would always be shut down, and when they were, I was often able to ask the gate agent if I could go out on the ramp to photograph the aircraft. Needless to say, I was always hoping that there were lots of Canadians on the flight heading to Miami ... because the more Canadian passengers there were, the longer I could be out on the ramp.

Great shot and history of Eastern's B727 'Blue Hockeystick' Gary! Excellent history - Thank you for sharing! This brings back many memories of Eastern operating here at Boston Logan Airports Terminal A. All 5 and many more!

Cool shot and story, Gary!

Great insight Gary! I would never have realised that EAL were flying that route out of Miami all the way north up to Buffalo and then flying a super short international leg across into Toronto. It would have been a fairly long day even for the B727 crews, let alone the crews in the L188. That is assuming that the first crew didn't actually get off in Toronto and put their feet up for an RON in a nice Canadian hotel...

Darryl & Greg ... Hi. Thanx for your kind complis, guys. Darryl ... I flew into BOS twice on MOH. I was 16 the first time and 17 the last. Bought those Weekends Unlimited tickets for $25.. I would fly to Logan, stay at the airport a couple hours to photograph aircraft, then fly back to BUF. (I had to get back to BUF by 4:30 or 5:00 because I had to get back home so my folks wouldn't find out that I'd ever been anywhere except at the Buffalo airport.) When I was at KBOS I spent much of my time at the Eastern, Northeast, and Braniff gates.
Chris ... You are certainly right about that Buffalo-Toronto leg being "super short." It is only 64 miles by air from Buffalo to Toronto. It's almost twice as far by car ... about 110 miles. (I used to drive it -- a couple of us guys would cross into Canada and mosey up to Toronto -- I don't ever recall seeing much of the city --- we'd get off the 401 at Yonge St and drive toward the waterfront -- we ALWAYS enjoyed visiting that area (Gawd, I LOVED Toronto back then -- Canadian gals were always so welcoming to us). Ah, let's see, what was I about to say? Oh, yeah, I remember now. Eastern ran that route because Miami was a very popular destination for both the Buffalonians and the Torontonians. So the Canadians would board at Pearson and about half the plane would be filled. Then the plane would hop over Lake Erie and land at Buffalo and the New Yorkers would board and the flight would be full. The return flight would stop at Buffalo and the New Yorkers would deplane. Then the plane would scoot over the lake to Toronto and the Canadians would exit. In that way, Eastern always had a full load of pax when the flight departed Buffalo to go to Miami and the flight from Miami back was also always full. Now, as I was saying earlier, did I mention how very, VERY much I loved visiting Toronto as an 18 year old? lol lol