![]() CRJs at Memphis the morning of March 9, 2009, with N8924B in front. N8976E pauses in the sun at MSP, June 12, 2007. N8516C in the “gulch” between the A concourse and B satellite concourse at MSP, Nov. N8516C taxis to the gates at MSP on a hot July 2005 afternoon. N8516C readies for takeoff from MSP, July 2005. N8745B resting at Milwaukee in July 2005. N8797A landing at Milwaukee in July 2005. N8908D pulling into Cincinnati in the afternoon of March 9, 2005. If you use these photos, please credit the Northwest Airlines History Center – please also contact us to let us know how you’re using them and if we can be of further help! N8505Q rolls toward the commuter gates at MSP on Feb. Top-up orders for more -200s and the -440 series would bring the 50-seat fleet to 136 airframes by the time of the Delta merger (at that point then flying for Pinnacle). Mesaba would be tagged for later deliveries and the CRJ would be seen on short to medium range routes everywhere east of the Rocky Mountains by the mid-2000s. These aircraft would be initially delivered to Express Airlines I and deployed from the Memphis hub. NWA joined the Bombardier advisory council (which would later contribute to the specifications for its CS100 project) and placed a then-record $1.3 billion order in February 1999 for 54 CRJ-200LRs. ![]() Northwest was interested in future airframe stretches should their pilot contract be amended, which struck the already-long 145 from the list. Saab pitched its model 2000 fifty-seat turboprop, but this was ruled out, leaving the field to Embraer’s 145 and Bombardier’s CRJ, each also with around fifty seats. NWA’s traffic was growing, but their pilot contract scope clause only left enough room for 54 regional jets, with a maximum 60 seats. Rather, the move toward small jet equipment lay more in the need for aircraft with intermediate capacity between 34-seat Saabs and the smaller DC-9-10s which were quickly nearing the end of their life cycles. Republic had learned that high-frequency operations with smaller-capacity prop aircraft were much more effective at generating new traffic than using DC-9s only once or twice per day, and Northwest was not about to abandon that successful strategy. Northwest was not as quick as many other network carriers to jump aboard the regional-jet trend of the mid-1990s, recognizing that turboprop economics on its shorter-haul sectors remained much better than even the new RJs could approach, and on runs to stations like Tupelo, Brainerd, and Flint, there was not enough of a difference in block times to squeeze in an extra rotation per day.
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