Deli Mike or Deli Mayk (Mad Mike) is a Turkish Airlines Airbus A340-300 aircraft with civil registration TC-JDM, which experienced a number of unexpected technical problems. It joined the fleet in 1996 to replace Turkish Airlines’ McDonnell Douglas DC-10s and was used for long-haul flights from Turkey. The aircraft was nicknamed Deli Mike, a pun on the International Civil Aviation Organization’s spelling alphabet, due to its frequent bizarre technical malfunctions, such as landing gear not retracting and lights illuminating differently. In the last years of its service, the aircraft operated both long-haul and short-haul flights. In 2016, it was reorganized to have only economy class seats and was used to carry Hajj passengers.
In early 2019, it was removed from the Turkish Airlines fleet. The same year, it was re-registered as 2-AVRA after being flown to O. R. Tambo International Airport in Johannesburg. After being stored there for almost 4 years, the aircraft was flown to Mehrabad Airport in December 2022. Although the aircraft could not be purchased by Iran due to the sanctions imposed, Mahan Air allegedly owned the aircraft by circumventing the sanctions through a Burkina Faso-based subsidiary. Iran’s Civil Aviation Organization later confirmed the purchase of four Airbus A340 aircraft.
read more:
Deli Mike: Background
In the late 1980s, Turkish Airlines started to expand to North America and East Asia. Since the long-range McDonnell Douglas DC-10s used at that time were being phased out of the fleet, the Airbus A310 was the only model left in the fleet that could be used for these routes. However, since the Airbus A310 did not have sufficient range to fly to these destinations, flights would have to be diverted in order to refuel. In January 1990, after evaluating two new generation aircraft models, the Airbus A340 and the McDonnell Douglas MD-11, which were still in the design phase, an internal committee of the company unanimously decided to purchase the Airbus A340 due to its technical and financial advantages. On March 27, 1990, a firm order for five Airbus A340-300 aircraft and an optional order for five aircraft were placed. TC-JDM joined the Turkish Airlines fleet in April 1996 as the fourth Airbus A340 and was named Izmir.
Cockpit of TC-JDM in flight
Technical issues and alias
After delivery, the aircraft began to experience unexpected technical problems and malfunctions. From time to time, the aircraft’s exterior lights would turn on spontaneously and turn off just as someone was about to intervene; the lights indicating the emergency exit door would not all turn on at the same time, but in order from front to back “like a Mexican wave”. According to the flight attendants, the lights turning on from front to back meant that Mad Mayk was “in a good mood”. The flight attendants said the plane was playing “pranks” and once, for no apparent reason, a warning alarm went off in the cockpit, causing one of the inexperienced cabin crew members to panic. Common problems on board the plane included a different passenger’s light turning on when the button used to turn on the reading light in the seat or to call cabin crew was pressed. According to one story among the flight crew, an “old” mechanic would fix the plane’s faulty flight indicator without doing anything except banging on the door and asking “what happened to you, big guy?”
Despite uninstalling and reinstalling all systems on the plane and reinstalling the plane’s software to fix the problems, no solution was found. The technicians said of Mad Mike: “If he wants, he can fly to the other side of the world without any problem. If he doesn’t feel like it, he won’t move even a meter on the ground.” Technicians working at Turkish Technic, the aircraft maintenance sub-brand of Turkish Airlines, began to informally refer to the aircraft as Deli Mike or Deli Mayk, changing “Delta” to “Deli” in reference to the technical problems it was experiencing, since the last two letters of the aircraft’s registration, D and M, are spelled “Delta Mike” according to the phonetic alphabet of the International Civil Aviation Organization.
Exiting Turkish Airlines and afterwards
In 2011, with his old paint job, Mad Mike
During the 2010s, Airbus A340s at Turkish Airlines were used on both short domestic flights and long-haul flights. No one was injured in September 2011 when Deli Mike went off the runway during landing at Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport in Mumbai. Turkish Airlines withdrew all Airbus A340s from scheduled flights from May 2016. The aircraft were reorganized to include only economy class seats, without business class. After July, the aircraft were only used on charter flights to carry Hajj passengers.
In the winter of 2016, dozens of aircraft, including Deli Mike, were temporarily grounded by Turkish Airlines due to a drop in demand. In August 2017, Hürriyet reported that Turkish Airlines planned to use its Airbus A340 aircraft on Hajj flights until 2021 “thanks to good maintenance.” As of September 2017, Deli Mike was Turkish Airlines’ oldest aircraft. In February 2018, Sözcü’s Bora Erdin criticized Turkish Airlines for ordering new planes when many of its planes were grounded, while at the same time stating that the airline “did not explain why [Deli Mike] was persistently used”, pointing out that the plane often suffered from a landing gear failure that caused it to return to the departure airport.
On 22 October 2018, TC-JDM and its sister aircraft TC-JDN were grounded by Turkish Airlines at Ataturk Airport. The aircraft was retired from the fleet in January 2019 and its paintwork was removed that same month. Initially, rumors surfaced that Deli Mike would be converted into a restaurant, as had happened to three sister aircraft before. After being flown to O. R. Tambo International Airport in Johannesburg in March, it was sold to a Hong Kong-based company for use by Africa Charter Airline, stored in Johannesburg, and registered in Guernsey and re-registered as 2-AVRA. In December 2022, Deli Mike and three other former Turkish Airlines Airbus A340 aircraft took off for the first time in years. The aircraft departed Johannesburg for Uzbekistan in succession on 24 December, but all declared an in-flight emergency and shut down their tracking systems, making an emergency landing at Mehrabad Airport in Tehran. The planes were transferred to Mahan Air’s Burkina Faso-based subsidiary and registered in Burkina Faso. A few days after the operation was allegedly carried out to circumvent sanctions on Iran, Iran’s Civil Aviation Organization confirmed the purchase of four Airbus A340 aircraft.
- ^ “THY’nin efsanesi “Deli Mike” yeniden gökyüzünde”. AirportHaber. 24 Aralık 2022. 25 Aralık 2022 tarihinde kaynağından arşivlendi. Erişim tarihi: 25 Aralık 2022.
- ^ “Iran gebruikt oude truc om aan Airbus A340’s te komen” [İran, A340’lara kavuşmak için eski numaraları kullanıyor]. Luchtvaartnieuws (Felemenkçe). 27 Aralık 2022. 31 Aralık 2022 tarihinde kaynağından arşivlendi. Erişim tarihi: 31 Aralık 2022.
- ^ Mehdi, Syed Zafar (29 Aralık 2022). “Iran confirms purchase of 4 Airbus A340s amid sanctions” [İran, yaptırımlar sırasında 4 Airbus A340 satın aldığını doğruladı]. Anadolu Ajansı (İngilizce). 23 Ocak 2023 tarihinde kaynağından arşivlendi. Erişim tarihi: 24 Eylül 2023.
