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Aviation History
1951
1951 - 1933.PDF
4O2 FLIGHT, 21 September i ,5! MASS AIR TRAVEL? Main Topic of Discussion at the I.A.T.A. Conference in London TO express the opinion that "air transport is now hereto stay" lays one open to the accusation of stating theobvious. But the question of whether or not it is here to stay in its present form is one which some 160 representa- tives of the world's leading airlines were earnestly discussing at I.A.T.A.'s annual general meeting in London last week. Following the opening of the assembly by the Prime Minister on Monday, September loth (already reported in these pages), the delegates heard during the week the reports of the Association's financial, legal, technical, medical and traffic committees. The results of their deliberations will give a general indication of the lines along which future resolutions will be made on these topics by the individual committees. Last week's I.A.T.A. session is of special importance in that it came at a time when the world's air transport system is about to feel the impact of several revolutionary develop- ments. In the first place, having experienced such a pheno- menal growth in its short span of existence, and consequently having proved itself such a powerful influence on civilization itself, air transport has now reached the stage at which a decision must be made on the actual extent to which the market can be beneficially widened. Hitherto, it has remained largely a medium of travel which only the relatively rich could enjoy. However, as Sir Miles Thomas pointed out in his first address as president of I.A.T.A., it is in fact a social responsibility of the air travel industry that its services should be available not only to the favoured few, but "to every citizen in the world." Certainly, the idea of making air travel available to the masses is one of the things which is now foremost in the minds of all airline planners, and during last week's conference it was seen that much of the discussion revolved around these possibilities. In the second place, technical progress during the past 40 years has steadily brought about an increase in cruising speeds—now largely enhanced as a result of development of the gas-turbine power unit—a factor which, although carrying with it a number of difficulties yet to be solved, stands out as the second major influence in the changing character of air transport. The realization that there now exists a market in which, potentially at least, air travel can be made available to the world's middle-income groups has naturally been suggested by traffic results achieved to date. Some indication of these figures, and of the mass travel plans which are now being investigated by the world's airlines, were contained in the annual report presented by I.A.T.A.'s director-general, Sir William Hildred, before last week's assembly. Sir William's main points may be summarized as fo lows. Of the statistical results he said that "1950 was a wonderful year in the matter of traffic volume," and that "many airlines are reporting with amazement the spectacular results of the first half of 1951." The 30,000,000 passengers carried by the airlines in 1950 represented a 15 per cent increase over the number carried the year before: they travelled a total of 26,000,000,000 passenger kilometres. The average stage- length equalled the distance between Paris and Prague, or Montreal and Detroit. The total of cargo ton-kilometres for 1950 showed an even more remarkable increase of 33 per cent over the 1949 figure; the total was 750,000,000. It was estimated that if a single passenger and one ton of cargo had done the travelling represented by these cumulative figures, the passenger would have spent 60 years circling the globe 660,000 times at the equator, while the unit of cargo would have made the flight 20,000 times. In all, the airlines provided 210,000,000 ton-kilometres of mail transport during 1950, a 12 per cent increase over the 1949 total. The number of aircraft in the airline fleets remained at about 2,500, but their higher speeds and larger payloads now provided 40 per cent more passenger and cargo capacity than existed four years ago. The major re-equipment programmes of many companies during the next year should increase these figures substantially. Annual gross revenues of the airlines during 1950 amounted to approximately 11,500,000,000. Approxi- mately 200,000 people, of whom 10 per cent were aircrew, were now employed by the airlines. Sir William Hildred went on to say that a fact which should cheer the airlines on to an even better record was that the preliminary statistics for 1950 indicated that the safety record would show still further improvement. Reviewing the accomplishments of the air- lines during the five years of I.A.TA's post-war activity Sir William pointed out that the Association's traffic conferences had created a world-wide pattern of rates and fares which have already achieved wide flexibility in promotional rates, short of the two-fare system. At the same time, he said, fare increases had been kept far behind the rising costs of other commodities and services, and some actual reductions had been effected. The American factory worker would formerly have had to work 540 hours to earn a transatlantic airline ticket, but the excursion fare over the North Atlantic this year represented only 260 hours of work for him. "Although this is not good enough to promote a mass vacation exchange of workers between the industrial plants of Europe and America we are getting closer to it," added Sir William. He continued: "We have been able to absorb during the last four years the largest At Westminster: Enjoying a jest with the Prime Minister are (left to right) Roushdy Bey (Misrair), M. brknd (Air France) and M. Perier (Sabena); before the micro- phone is Sir William Hildred. Below: Per A. Norlin. (S.A.S.) and Mr. Hudson Fysh (Qantas) listen to a speech: and Mr. John Watkins (T.A.A.) discuses Australian affairs with Sir Keith Smith (B.C.P1)-
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