Comments on: Toys in the Attic

By: Patrick

Patrick — Sun, 18 Jan 2026 18:44:05 +0000

In reply to Thomas. Later those flight numbers were assigned to the little Airbus that BA flew between London City Airport and JFK.

By: Thomas

Thomas — Sun, 11 Jan 2026 00:19:21 +0000

British Airways flight 1 used to be LHR to JFK by Concorde. Flight 2 was the return trip.

By: Thomas Flynn

Thomas Flynn — Wed, 26 Nov 2025 18:34:42 +0000

This post really brings back a lot of memories. I flew AA #11 and #12 several times back in the day…beginning in 1979. A quick check of the AA website shows that Flight #12 still exists today as the LAX to BOS flight. I still keep my bag tags to this day. With almost 800 flown flights (the majority of which I had a checked bag), my “archives” are bursting at the seams! Thank you Patrick for the great piece.

By: Carol

Carol — Thu, 20 Nov 2025 18:01:48 +0000

So glad you wrote this. I’ll pay more attention. I still sort of regret giving away a vintage suitcase (perhaps 1950s) with a PanAm tag on it.

By: Javier Lifa

Javier Lifa — Wed, 19 Nov 2025 13:19:50 +0000

This makes very interesting reading indeed.
Traditionally, the Aerolíneas Argentinas isologo showed a condor and two big letters: AA.
Which is sometimes confusing, given that AA can easily be mistaken for American Airlines. And while the former’s flight numbers are preceded by “AR”, it’s all too common to see news headlines using AA for Aerolíneas Argentinas.

By: plam

plam — Wed, 19 Nov 2025 03:48:55 +0000

There may only be one flight per day with one flight number departing from one airport, but there can be shenanigans where you have, for instance, AC33 YYZ-YVR and then AC33 YVR-SYD. Most often these are operated by the same aircraft and so they can’t be in the air simultaneously. But this is not always true! So you can potentially indeed have two AC33s in the air when there is a delay on the YYZ-YVR (AC33 Alpha) and the YVR-SYD (AC33 Beta) takes off before the YYZ-YVR lands.

Of course our author has to know this, but maybe others don’t.

By: plam

plam — Tue, 18 Nov 2025 20:26:04 +0000

I’ve also noticed that non-US carriers have more conventions for flight numbers. US carriers seem to use arbitrary numbers these days. Air Canada uses first digit 0 for Asian flights, first digit 8 for Europe flights, etc.

AC1 is thus Toronto to Haneda these days.

NZ1 currently connects JFK to AKL, though it’s been AKL-LAX-LGW/LHR (and flown the Queen).

By: Bob Cowen

Bob Cowen — Tue, 18 Nov 2025 19:52:45 +0000

I’ve flown NW1776 to PHL, NW1492 to CMH, NW711 to LAS, all from DTW.

By: Greybeard

Greybeard — Tue, 18 Nov 2025 16:41:20 +0000

Besides the origin of flight numbers, I’m pretty sure that a given flight number can only depart from a given airport once per day. A decade or so ago, I was on a redeye SFO-IAD whose departure was delayed past midnight, necessitating a flight number change (which is why I think the rule above exists, which would make some sense). I (and presumably 200 other pax) then had to fight United for the miles, since they managed to completely lose track of the flight! They never admitted it existed, finally said they were crediting the miles as a “goodwill gesture”. This can’t be the only such incident…

By: Michael Jennings

Michael Jennings — Sat, 15 Nov 2025 09:54:09 +0000

One of the “prestigious” routes I have been familiar with is QF1/QF2, which Qantas have used for their flagship Sydney to London service for a very long time. It’s been interesting to watch the evolution of its routing over the years. When I was a kid in the 1970s it was SYD-SIN-BAH-LHR. Then it became SYD-SIN-LHR (and at times SYD-BKK-LHR) once the 747-400 came along, then SYD-DXB-LHR for a while when Qantas became close with Emirates, then back to SYD-SIN-LHR. I flew an unusual SYD-DRW-LHR routing with a QF1 flight number during COVID. This flight number will presumably reach its culmination in a year or two when it finally becomes nonstop.

Qantas used QF1 since well before that though. They have flown to London since 1947 (and in partnership with other airlines since 1935) and the number of stops has been steadily dropping throughout that time. I am not sure when they started using QF1 / QF2 though. I’d love to know.