Federal Express McDonnell Douglas DC-10-30

Additional Information:

The McDonnell Douglas DC-10 is an American trijet wide-body aircraft manufactured by McDonnell Douglas. The DC-10 was intended to succeed the DC-8 for long-range flights. It first flew on August 29, 1970 and it was introduced on August 5, 1971, by American Airlines.
The trijet has two turbofans on underwing pylons and a third one at the base of the vertical stabilizer. The twin-aisle layout has a typical seating for 270 in two classes. The initial DC-10-10 had a 4,000 mile range for transcontinental flights.

Federal Express is a cargo airline based in Memphis, Tennessee which first commenced operations in 1973. The carrier operates a “super hub” for cargo at its home base of Memphis. Federal Express began serving Albuquerque from Memphis later in the 1970’s using small Dassault Falcon 20 jet aircraft. Federal Express adopted the nickname “FedEx” and officially took on that name in 1994. The company grew quickly specializing in overnight package delivery and obtained larger aircraft including Boeing 727’s and 737’s and later acquired even larger wide body aircraft. FedEx now serves Albuquerque with morning and evening flights each day to Memphis using wide body Airbus A-300 and Douglas DC-10 aircraft. Federal Express began using DC-10s when the “small package” airline began to expand. The 30 is an enlarged version of the 20 that is twenty feet longer with more power engines.

Service to Albuquerque was handled by two Boeing 727s with two flights a day. These aircraft would typically stay overnight parked near the old terminal and Mueller Aviation. However, on March 12, 1986 while heading to Los Angeles this Federal Express DC-10-30 N310FE was forced to make a precautionary landing at the Albuquerque Sunport when an engine fire warning light came on. There was no fire and it was discovered that the warning light went on because of faulty wiring. This was the first time the DC-10-30 type had landed in Albuquerque.

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