During my drive home from work this evening at 6:15 local time, I saw an aircraft taking off from 32L at O’Hare. It’s a jet with 3 engines, 2 under the wing, 1 on the tail. #2 is inside the fuselage, not straight through above, so it’s not a DC10 or MD11. The only thing I can think of right now that fits that description would be an L-1011, but who are still flying those? It has a red tail, but I couldn’t get a good look at the logo (I was driving at high speed at the time and trying not to get myself killed) and didn’t recognize it. I’ve checked FlightAware, and I don’t see anything interesting during that time period. Some operators choose to hide their aircraft from this type of tracking service though, so that doesn’t necessarily mean anything. I’m curious if anyone has a better idea of who and what that aircraft is. Thanks.
I’m sure that someone is still flying L-1011’s. Also, was it relatively big or small? It could have been a 727 as well (narrow body, smaller than the L-1011’s).
There are a few jets out there with S-ducts like the L-1011 and the 727:
From O’Hare, I think we can rule out the Yaks and the Tupolevs. There are still a few L-1011s flying, but mostly in Africa. There are some 727s still in service:
The only aircraft on the list that has both an S-duct, and wing-mounted engines is the L-1011.
A total of 5 Lockheed L-1011s were in commercial service in March 2010.
Also, of course, a few non-American planes. I’m not sure how common any of these are in the US:
Tu-154
Yak-40/-42
Hawker Siddeley Trident
Dassault Falcon 50, 900, 7x
ETA: yep, too slow, Johnny LA beat me.
Yeah the L-1011 is the only one that seems to fit. I can’t find any modern examples with a red tail though. This is the Orbital Sciences L-1011, while it has red trim it’s not a red tail.
I think it’s safe to say it is NOT Sky Capital, the RAF, or EuroAtlantic Airways. I can’t find anything out about Elite Aviation or SAM Intercontinental except that SAM Intercontinental is an African company. Judging by the horrible photoshopping of livery to the Sky Capital L-1011 photos I doubt they have one painted in their colours yet, let alone flying. I wonder if there are any privately owned L-1011s around ala John Travolta’s Qantas B707.
never mind…
Thanks guys. I suppose it could be privately owned. The logo doesn’t look like Orbital Sciences.
That photoshopped aircraft on Sky Capital’s website is hilarious. It doesn’t really inspire any confidence now, does it? 
ATA used to have a few L-1011’s flying around when they went out of buisness in 2008-- I wonder if someone picked those up since the wikipedia page was last updated.
The only two privately owned L-1011s that seem to be in the USA are blue on white. I can’t find any references to any others that are still operating, certainly not with red livery.
Could it have been one of these flying for Purolator? There are several B-727s flying for Purolator, though, so narrowing it down to the exact plane might be tough, but I think that’s most likely to be the livery you saw. A quick Googling suggests that they do fly in and out of ORD.
[hijack]
Orbital selected the L-1011, because the bottom of the craft had two spars [?] on the bottom which would allowed the Pegasus to be carried without a major structural modification of the fuselage.
[/hijack]
I couldn’t get a very good look at the livery. I guess it could have been one of those, but I’m fairly certain that the thing had 2 wing mounted engines. However, since my attention was divided at the time, and considering that there aren’t very many airworthy L-1011s today, I admit that I could have got some of the details wrong.
This is what their two L-1011s actually look like.
S2-AET in April with a lot of people milling around it.
S2-AKB also in April. I somehow suspect that neither of them are going to be flying in the near future.
I’m increasingly doubting it was an L-1011. This siteseems to have a pretty comprehensive list (which matches other lists I’ve found) and none of them really have a red tail at all. The two that are maybe the closest are
CS-TMP, but I have a hard time imagining that the OP retained “red” from that paint scheme. Also, it’s pretty much based in Europe/Middle east!
HS-SEC - also not flying in the USA and more blue than red anyways.
I keep coming back to the Tristar owned by the Kansas City Airline History Museum, which was originally painted in TWA colours - red tail and all- but is now in another livery and isn’t currently airworthy anyways. I don’t think they’ve repainted it or made it flyable, but it might be possible.
This is such a fun challenge…yes, I’m an aircraft geek!
I’m still thinking it’s a Purolator aircraft if it isn’t a DC-10 or MD-10/11.
Otherwise, although you said the third engine looked blended, could it have been a Swissair MD-11? Or TAM?
I wonder what’s more likely, that Waffle Decider mistook a straight through tail engine for an S-duct type, or that he saw two wing mounted engines when all three were tail mounted. I’m thinking it’s more likely he misidentified the tail engine which means we’d be looking for a DC10/MD11.
ATA bought one from LTU and left it in LTU livery with an ATA logo. Wonder if that was it.
Oops, guess not.
Hmm, I’m leaning towards misidentifying a Purolator B727. I don’t think TAM flies to Chicago, and according to both Wikipedia and Swissair’s website, they no longer fly MD11s…
For what it’s worth I asked an L1011 Capt. on PPRuNe, he’s been flying the Tristar since 1980 and is not aware of any L1011s that fit your description.
The L1011 at the Kansas City Airline History Museum barely got the FAA approval to fly it from Roswell NM to KC. It arrived back in late January and isn’t going anywhere now - it’s permanently parked at the museum.