Avro RJ70

Updated: October 2026 – A high-set wing, four engines, a T-tail and a fuselage barely longer than the wings are wide: if you come across an aircraft like that, you are looking at the short version of the BAe 146 family. Whether it is an original 146-100 or its modernized successor, the Avro RJ70, is hard to say from the outside. That is exactly what this page is about: what makes the RJ70, why so few were built, who flew it and how to cleanly tell it from its predecessor.

What is the Avro RJ70?

The Avro RJ70 is the reworked version of the BAe 146-100, the shortest version of the four-engine British regional jet. British Aerospace designed the 146 for short routes, small airports and noise-sensitive cities. The prototype – a 146-100 – first flew on September 3, 1981, and Dan-Air put the type into service in 1983. The whole story of the original version is in the profile of the BAe 146-100.

In the early 1990s, the manufacturer decided on a thorough modernization. The aircraft were henceforth sold under the long-established name Avro, built by the subsidiary Avro International Aerospace at Woodford near Manchester. The numbers in the name roughly indicate the typical seat count: RJ70, RJ85 and RJ100 correspond to the fuselage lengths of the 146-100, -200 and -300. The short version was the last to be brought up to the new standard. The first RJ70s went to customers in late 1993, after the longer RJ85 had already arrived at Crossair in spring 1993.

Commercially, the RJ70 remained a fringe product. According to the aviation safety database SKYbrary, only twelve aircraft were built. For comparison: across the entire Avro RJ production, around 170 aircraft came together by 2003, the lion’s share of them RJ85s and RJ100s.

RJ70 or 146-100? Telling them apart in detail

This is the question on which everything hinges with the short version. The short answer: the airframe is the same, the insides are not. The RJ70 took over fuselage, wing, tail and landing gear from the 146-100. Dimensions, seating capacity and the maximum takeoff weight of around 38.1 tonnes also agree in the standard data sheets.

Avro changed mainly two areas:

• Engines: instead of the Lycoming ALF 502, the RJ70 got the further-developed LF 507. They work with a fully digital engine control (FADEC) that monitors and controls the engine electronically. The nacelles were reworked for the RJ line. Today Honeywell supports the engines.
• Cockpit: the RJ line received digital avionics with screen displays (EFIS) instead of the analog round instruments of the early 146.

Feature	BAe 146-100	Avro RJ70
ICAO type designator	B461	RJ70
Deliveries from	1983	Late 1993
Final assembly	Hatfield	Woodford
Engines	4 × ALF 502R	4 × LF 507 with FADEC
Cockpit	analog	digital (EFIS)
Length / wingspan	approx. 26.2 m / 26.3 m	approx. 26.2 m / 26.3 m
Seats	70–82	70–82

For British aircraft, the public register helps you, as described in British G- registrations. If a registration in your photo is blurry, you will find tricks in Working out an unreadable registration.

How to recognize the RJ70 in the field

Family membership is quickly settled – a high wing, four engines and a T-tail in this combination exist on no other regional jet. The harder question is which fuselage length you are looking at.

One detail that makes the whole family easy: the tail ends in a cone that opens left and right like a clamshell on landing. This large airbrake replaces the thrust reverser the 146 never had. The main landing gear sits in fairings on the sides of the fuselage because there is no room for it in the high-mounted wing.

Risk of confusion with other small jets

Serious confusion usually only happens at long distance or in backlight, when you can’t count the engines. In the size class of around 70 seats, the Fokker 70 and the CRJ700 were mainly around in the 1990s, and the Embraer E170 joined later. The finder helps you sort them out.

How to systematically tell apart the whole class of regional jets is shown in the guide Recognizing regional jets.

The operators: short careers, many changes

The story of the RJ70 is a story of detours. The launch customer was the US regional airline Business Express of Connecticut, which flew for Delta Connection and placed a larger order in the early 1990s. The service was short: according to Flight International of January 1996, the airline returned its three RJ70s, withdrew from jet operations and converted nine further firm orders into options. Year-round operation with regional jets had not been viable for it at the time.

The three aircraft quickly found a new home: they went to airBaltic in Latvia, which operated them from Riga Airport from 1996. For around ten years, the small four-engine jet was part of the young airline’s image. One of the aircraft was in service in Australia in between and briefly with Azzurra Air in Italy and flew for several months in 2002 for Drukair in Bhutan.

In the Mediterranean, Air Malta was an important customer. The airline ordered four RJ70s in 1992, initially for connections to Sicily, and according to a fleet overview flew them from 1994 to 1998 out of Malta Airport. In Italy, Azzurra Air – in which Air Malta held a stake – operated RJ70s and RJ85s on behalf of Alitalia until the aircraft left service in 2003.

From the end of 2006, several former airBaltic aircraft moved on, among others to Air One, to Sweden’s Transwede and to Malmö Aviation. In 2012 and 2013, these three aircraft were scrapped in Romania according to the fleet history.

Where you can still see an RJ70 today

As of October 2026, the RJ70 no longer plays a role in regular scheduled service in Europe. Several aircraft have been scrapped, and the rest fly in niches. A well-known example is the British technology and test services provider QinetiQ, which operates an RJ70 and showed it in the static display at the Royal International Air Tattoo in Fairford in 2023. Air shows are therefore one of the more realistic opportunities to experience the short Avro up close – you will find an overview of worthwhile events in Airshows in Europe for plane spotters.

For the search, you filter in your tracking app for RJ70 and – for the outwardly identical sister – for B461. How ADS-B data comes about and why some flights are missing is explained in Flight tracking with ADS-B. If you want to keep an eye on a specific aircraft, the guide Tracking an aircraft by registration will help.

You can rate how special your sighting really is with Gauging the rarity of a sighting – an RJ70 is guaranteed to land near the top. General strategies for hunting rarities are in Spotting rare aircraft. And where retired aircraft often end up is explained in Aircraft graveyards and boneyards.

Technology: what the Avro modernization brought

The 146 came about in the late 1970s with a clear goal: short runways, steep approaches, little noise. Four small turbofans delivered enough thrust for short takeoffs, and the high wing with large flaps allowed slow approaches. That is why the family was among the first jets approved at London City Airport with its steep approach. For the RJ70, this basic concept stayed unchanged.

The LF 507 with FADEC simplified monitoring and operation of the engines, and the digital cockpit made the two pilots’ work easier. According to the data sheet, the RJ70 with 82 passengers flies around 3,900 kilometers and needs only around 1,200 meters of runway to take off. That suited island airports and regional links like those Air Malta and airBaltic had in their programs.

The modernization did nothing about the basic problem, though: four engines mean more maintenance and more fuel burn than two. In the class of around 70 seats in particular, the RJ70 also met strong twinjet competition. A further improved generation called the RJX with new engines was stopped by BAE Systems in November 2001 – an RJX-70 was never built. You can read more about the manufacturer’s history in the profile of BAE Systems.

Photo tips for the short Avro

If an RJ70 comes in front of your lens, it is usually a one-time opportunity. So plan as much as possible beforehand.

Which direction the aircraft lands from depends on the runway direction in use – more on that in Understanding the runway direction in use at an airport.

Conclusion

The Avro RJ70 is the short, modernized edition of the BAe 146-100: the same airframe, but LF 507 engines with FADEC and a digital cockpit. With only twelve aircraft, it remained the smallest series of the Avro RJ line and frequently changed hands between Business Express, airBaltic, Air Malta, Azzurra Air and other operators. From the outside it is hard to tell from the 146-100; against the RJ85 and RJ100, fuselage length helps.