The Tupolev Tu-124 (NATO reporting name: Cookpot) is a 56-passenger short-range twin-jet airliner built in the Soviet Union.

[1] Developed from the medium-range Tupolev Tu-104 jetliner , the Tu-124 was meant to meet Aeroflot's requirement for a regional airliner/jetliner to replace the Ilyushin Il-14 on domestic routes.

The Tu-124 had a number of refinements, including double-slotted flaps, a large center-section airbrake and automatic spoilers.

[3][5] Deliveries to Aeroflot began in August 1962, with the type operating its first scheduled passenger service, between Moscow and Tallinn in Estonia, on 2 October 1962.

The improved Tu-124V, which could seat 56 passengers instead of the 44 of the original model, and which had increased range and maximum takeoff weight, came into service in 1964.

Despite the aircraft's low purchase price (stated as $1.45 million in 1965) and low operating costs,[7] few were exported, with Československé Státní Aerolinie (ČSA) and the East German airline Interflug being the only airlines other than Aeroflot that bought the Tu-124 new, although ČSA sold its surviving Tu-124s to Iraqi Airways for use on VIP flights in 1973.

[10] A total of fifteen Tu-124s were written off in crashes during the type's operational career; another two aircraft of Iraqi Airways were destroyed on the ground during the Gulf War.