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Aviation History
1947
1947 - 0592.PDF
35O FLIGHT APRIL 17TH, 1947 REINSTATED : Vikingswill be flying on B.E.A.C. Continental routes againnext Monday, Mr. B. W. A. Dickson, director ofVickers and W/C M. Sum- mers, sales manager, leftEngland in a Mark IB last Sunday to make a demon-stration tour of Australia and New Zealand. CIVIL AVIATION JV B.E.A.C.'s Operating Problems in First Winter : P.I.C.A.O. Airworthiness Division's Report WEST COUNTRY AIR CENTRET HE Bristol Company's export campaign and the direct attackbeing made on overseas markets was emphasized, on the occasion of Lord Nathan's visit to Bristol last Friday, by thearrival of the Merchant Venturer Wayfarer at Darwin on the same day. Before the Minister spoke at lunch, he was challenged bySir W G. Verdon-Smith, chairman of the company, to dis- close the methods by which he intended to obtain the resultsin civil aviation which everyone in this country wished to see The future, he said, would depend largely on the deci-sions of the Ministry, and development in all spheres was vital to civil aviation. The Lord Mayor, Alderman G. S. James,expressed his regret at the absence of Mr. H. J. Thomas, Sheriff of the city and assistant managing director of the company,who was still unwell. He paid a tribute to the part played by Bristol airciaft during the war in all parts of the world.Mr. W. R. Verdon-Smith, proposing the toast to the city, made a p*Iea for an early decision upon the whereabouts ofBristol's airport. Early in his speech Lord Nathan announced the selection ofBristol as the Divisional headquarters of the Ministry of Civil Aviation for the West of England. He considered the city to- be the centre of the West Country by tradition and by right. The Divisional headquarters, he explained, would consist ofa Divisional Controller, with, attached to him, a representative of each of the operational and technical divisions of the Min-istry, and he would be responsible for the day-to-day admin- istration of local civil aviation. The Minister also recognizedthe necessity of having a first-class civil airport at a city of the importance of Bristol, and referred to Whitchurch, whichhad been suitable for pre-war air services, but was not now able to provide the approaches which were required for modernaircraft. He did hope, however, that it would remain the centre for private and club flying in the West, and he wishedsuccess to the Bristol and Wessex Club. The choice of airport was between Filton and LulsgateBottom. He was not in a position to say categorically which would be approved, but Lulsgate Bottom had some opera-tional advantages and appeared to be somewhat cheaper to develop. In addition, Lulsgate Bottom could probably beready at an earlier date than Filton, as the latter would require additional runways to ensure regularity of operation.Lord Nathan saw the Bristol 167 for the first time, and if was to that aircraft, better known perhaps as the Brabazon I,that we looked, he said, with great expectations for flying on the air routes within the next five years.Special mention was made of the recent flight around the American continents by the Bristol Freighter, which in fivemonths had flown 41,000 miles through twenty-five countries in just under 300 flying hours He mentioned also the inter-esting feat achieved during the tour, of taking off in 37 sec carrying a 2-ton truck from the highest airfield in the world,at La Paz, 13,500ft above sea level. He congratulated Mr. Sims and the crew for their contribution to British aviationin visiting seventy-five towns and making 193 demonstration take-offs and landings without incident. That, he said, wasjust the sort of uneventful flying which would set. aviation firmly in its rightful place as a normal commercial business,and while it was necessary to have adventure in enterprise, it was necessary to take adventure out of everyday aviation. Lord Nathan next referred to the four-seater helicopterbeing developed by Bristol's and which gave promise of being the first all-British helicopter to fly on commercial services.Great things were expected of the helicopter, he said, par- ticularly when it acquired the safety factor of two engines.B.E.A. were to begin operational trials late this summer with American machines. As British-built helicopters were avail-able, the Corporation would be able to take them over with a background of experience on the experimental models. A broad hint was given that the project of fitting AmericanConstellations with Bristol Centaurus engines would be real- ized, and Lord Nathan referred to the pre-war Polish-operatedDouglas DC-gs which had been fitted with Bristol engines and were, consequently, faster than the standard American pro-duct. He was unable to say at this stage whether the project would mature as it had to be considered in relation to thewhole complex of Brit:sh aviation and the country's economic structure. Brief reference was made to the faultless run of156 hours in testing the Theseus. THE FIRST CLEARANCE "CpOURTEEN international airline companies made availableJ- their traffic accounts to the I.A.T.A. London Clearing House for January, the first month of operation. All clearancewas effected by March 23rd, and ^180,000 in transactions were settled for ^23,000. The most extreme case was a companyhaving credit transactions of ^15,000 but whose final settle- ment amounted to ^400. Thus, exchange costs on ^29,600were saved. "END OF THE BEGINNING" "DRITISH European Airways, starting as they did at the •L* end of last summer, felt the full impact of the hard winter in the task of opening up new routes and operating new air- craft, during their first half year. Mr. Anthony Milward, manager of the Continental Division in the Corporation, explained last week some of the difficulties in which they have beer, operating during this development period. He felt con- fident, however, that with the prospect of better weather anfl the return of the Vikings, the Corporation had passed its most difficult stage. The servicing of aircraft had presented the greatest problem
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