Description

The Hawker Siddeley HS-121 Trident is a British narrow-body jetliner, originally designed by the de Havilland aviation on a British European Airways (BEA) request . A match for the British engineering of its time, the Trident was a very advanced and sophisticated aircraft, which enabled it to be the first airliner to attempt a genuine blind landing, giving it a significant advantage while operating in weather challenging conditions in the British airports. Furthermore, it was one of the fastest subsonic commercial airliners of its era. However, being built around the BEA demands and falling victim to a lengthy development process, the aircraft fell behind its main competitor – Boeing 727 and failed to gain much popularity outside of the United Kingdom and the Commonwealth. With five variants of the jetliner produced, a total of 117 Tridents were built, and the final flight took to the skies in 1995.

The tag in your possession was crafted from the registration letters of the Trident 3B, registered as G-AWZU. Zulu Uniform first entered service with BEA in October 1972, and later continued it with the British Airways after the merger of the two companies in 1974. This Trident was one of the two aircraft, which performed the last service of its type for the British Airways on December 31, 1985. The aircraft was then passed to the Stansted Airport Fire Service brigade for training purposes, and retired from its duty in September 2003.

Today, you can visit the Jet Age Museum in Gloucester and see the nose section of Zulu Uniform on display.