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Aviation History
1948
1948 - 0263.PDF
FEBRUARY 26TH, 1948 FLIGHT 227 UNDER THE TRICOLOUR : An Airspsed Consul, belonging to the Soc/ete Indochinoise de Transports Aeriens, in compcny with an Air France ' Skymaster and a French military Ju 52 on the tarmac of Tan Son Nhut airfield, Saigon. The Dipstick Story : Grounding of Tudor IV a Precaution : Accident Records : The Atlantic Weather Ships In Parliament same period per million miles flown were 0.09, 0.07 and 0.66respectively. Mr. Ward asked to what Mr. Lindgren attributed the factthat the accident rate of B.S.A.A.C. did not compare favour- ably with those of the other two Corporations. Mr. Lindgrenreplied: "I do not think that the high accident rate is un- related to the fact that the operations of the Corporation arevery near to the bone. Mr. Lennox-Boyd asked what was meant by "near to the bone," and Mr. Lindgren replied:" The inference has been made, with some justification I think, that training and maintenance standards were not so high asthey should have been." AER LJNGUS /"QUESTIONS were asked by Air Commodore Harvey as to\£ what extent the British European Airways Corporation had been consulted by the Irish Air Line, Aer Lingus, regard-ing their decision to dispose of seven Vickers Viking aircraft. The reply was that the decision was made by the board of AerLingus, on which the B.E.A.C. is represented. Air Commo- dore Harvey thought the arrangement with Aer Lingus mostunsatisfactory. The British had a financial interest, and the decision made had caused great harm to the British aircraftindustry. The British side of the board should have more to say in what was to happen. To this Mr. Lindgren replied thatthey do have quite a lot to say, but it was votes that counted. To another question Mr. Lindgren replied that B.E.A.C. holdsten per cent of the shares in the Irish air line, and that the loss on current operations payable by the English corporation isapproximately 12J per cent. THE MAINTENANCE BASE TRANSFER of the B.O.A.C. Maintenance Base from Mon--»- treal to Filton was the subject of a question by Mr. Geoffrey Cooper, who wanted to know what was the targetdate. Mr. Lindgren replied that it was hoped to complete the transfer before the end of 1948. Mr. Cooper further statedthat for two years he had been making representations to the Department that this transfer should take place, and that hadnotice been taken we should have saved manv hundreds of ENERAL uneasiness about British civil aviation markedI -r question time in the House of Commons on February ^~^ 18th. On the subject of the dismissal of Air Vice-MarshalBennett, Mr. Lindgren repeated the statement made some days previously by Lord Nathan in " another place." The only newinformation given was that Air Vice-Marshal Bennett has ceased to be a member of the board of B.S.A.A. " He failedto resign, and therefore my noble friend declared the position vacant." Mr. George Ward asked whether the Parliamentary Secretarywas aware that a Tudor IV of B.S.A.A. recently landed at Bermuda with insufficient petrol to enable the aircraft to bocf jcied off the runway. Mr. Lindgren replied that the Governor, rl .Bermuda telegraphed that on November 14th Tudor IV0. M.HNK landed with insufficient fuel safely to complete a circuit of the airfield. Inquiries showed that the machine hadmet abnormally strong headwinds, of which the captain had received no adequate; warning. B.S.A.A. had stated that thedipstick gave a misleading reading because the aircraft was in a tail-down position; in fact, at least 100 gallons remained. In reply to another question Mr. Lindgren said he thoughtincidents such as this had a bearing on the lack of confidence of the board in their chief executive. Other questions dis-closed that this was the only instance of an aircraft landing at Bermuda actually short of petrol There had been two cases<> tiM- Air /Sea Rescue Service in Bermuda being alerted: one was shortage of petrol and the other an engine failure. Mr. Ivor Thomas asked his successor about the groundingof the Tudor IV aircraft, and was told that the Minister of Civil Aviation had made the decision following a report fromthe A.R.B., which advised that it would be prudent to ground the aircraft. 'Questions by Major Vernon and Mr. George Ward elicited the information that the accidents statistics for the three Cor-porations showed that for the 18 months up to January 31st, 1948, B.O.A.C. had flown some 432 million passenger-miles,B.E.A.C. 127 million, and B.S.A.A.C. 66 million. The numbers of fatal accidents to fare-paying passengers per million passen-ger-miles flown had been 0.025, nil, and 0.88 respectively. The "umbers of aircraft accidents involving fatalities during the
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