Lufthansa Group rang down the curtain on the tri-jet era on Sunday 17 October when its last MD-11F landed in Frankfurt. Flight LH8161 from New York JFK touched down ahead of schedule at 12:03 p.m. local time on runway 07R, marking the end of commercial service of the aircraft type at Lufthansa Cargo after more than 23 years. D-ALCC was also the last MD-11F registered in Europe, and will now be sold to an American cargo airline.
Lufthansa Cargo chief executive and chairman, Dorothea von Boxberg, declared: “We are very grateful to our MD-11F fleet for over two decades of loyal service. We know that this particular aircraft has an incredible number of fans, throughout our colleagues at Lufthansa as well as among aviation enthusiasts worldwide. The decisive factor for the introduction of the MD-11F at Lufthansa Cargo in the late nineties was its significantly better fuel efficiency compared to the widebody freighter previously used. In the future, we will rely on the twin-engine Boeing 777F for the same reason.”
Since November 2013, Lufthansa Cargo has been gradually replacing the MD-11F freighters with twin-engine Boeing 777 freighters, which are much quieter and operate with lower emissions.