AVIATION: The 880 Takes Off

At New York's Idlewild Airport last week, a trim, white-painted jetliner, smaller than the familiar Boeing 7075 and Douglas DC-8s. roared off the runway and headed south on Delta Air Lines Flight 873 to New Orleans. In 2 hr. 19 min., the jet touched down at New Orleans' Moisant International Airport, loaded another batch of passengers, and whistled back to New York in 2 hr. 10 min. Both flights, at speeds up to 593 m.p.h., set new commercial records for the 1,184-mile run and sent the nation's newest jetliner off to a high-flying start.

The plane: the Convair 880, designed...

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