@ Budapest, Hungary
March 2022
On my fourth trip to Budapest I was finally able to visit the Aeropark museum located adjacent to Budapest Ferenc Liszt International Airport. This is a very cool collection of Soviet-era airliners used by MALÉV Hungarian Airlines, the former flag carrier of Hungary (1946-2012). Here is a Yakovlev Yak-40, a regional jet designed by Yakovlev. First flown in 1966, more than 1,100 were produced from 1967-1981. The Yak-40 was the first Soviet-built airliner designed to Western airworthiness requirements. This Yak-40 was last used by the Flight Inspection Service to provide precision calibration/test flights of civil and tactical air navigation systems both in Hungary and abroad, joining the Aeropark collection in 2002.