Iran’s Aging Airliner Fleet Seen as Faltering Under U.S. Sanctions

Capt. Houshang Shahbazi was preparing to land at Tehran’s Imam Khomeini International Airport last October when a blinking red light in the cockpit of his 40-year-old Boeing 727 signaled that he had a big problem: the landing gear in the nose was jammed.

Behind the cockpit, in rows of cramped, outdated seats, sat 120 passengers who had boarded the Iran Air flight three hours earlier in Moscow. Captain Shahbazi and his crew performed all the emergency procedures, but the plane’s front wheel remained stuck.

As the passengers were told to prepare for a crash landing, Captain Shahbazi placed both hands on the controls and tried to banish thoughts of charred bodies and flaming wreckage.

When he joined Iran’s state airline in 1983, its fleet of Boeings and Airbuses was in mint technical condition. Whenever he walked down the gate toward his plane, black Aviator sunglasses under his pilot’s cap, Captain Shahbazi said, he would swell with pride and confidence.

full: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/14/world/middleeast/irans-airliners-falter-under-sanctions.html