McDonnell Douglas - DC-10-10
The DC-10 was primarily designed to meet a requirement for American Airlines, which specified an aircraft capable of transcontinental operations, had operating economics similar to the Boeing 747, and was sized for the US domestic market. Originally it was thought that this requirement could be met with a twin engine design, but the need to operate from high altitude airports such as Denver with an economic payload, and the engine technology of that time resulted in a three engine design. American Airlines placed an order for 25 with options for the aircraft in February 1968, and the program was launched in April of that year when United Airlines also placed a large order for the type. The initial domestic model was the DC10-10 of which 122 were produced from a total of 386 DC-10s.
The first DC-10-10s were delivered to American Airlines and United Airlines jointly on 29/07/1971, and the last -10 was delivered to United on 20/04/1981
A total of 34 DC-10-10s were converted to DC10-10F freighter configuration of which 27 were active as of July 2005. A further 21 -10s and 7 -10Fs were converted to MD-10-10Fs by FedEx Express. The MD10 program includes the conversion of the flight deck to a 2 crew configuration compatible with the MD-11.
In July 2005 there were only 3 DC10-10s in service with none in regular commercial passenger service
