FlightGlobal.com
Home
Premium
Archive
Video
Images
Forum
Atlas
Blogs
Jobs
Shop
RSS
Email Newsletters
You are in:
Home
Aviation History
1955
1955 - 0029.PDF
^mjanuary 1955 29 Acapulco, Mexico, is the setting of this new line in airport architecture. The airport is located one hour by Convair from Mexico City; Aeronaves de Mexico provide tour connecting services daily. Fas evenly shared between long-haul and short-haul operators. Mail traffic increased by an en-couraging 16 per cent, but air- freighting results were disappoint-ing : cargo ton-miles flown went up by only 3 per cent. This maybe partly accounted for by the fact that high-density touristaircraft offer less cargo space— and most air cargo is still carried - ...«•> as make-weight on passengerservices. The future of all-freight services continues to depend on the availability of suitable freight aircraft for both long andshort distances. The lion's share of all scheduled air traffic went to the 71member airlines of the International Air Transport Association, operating a total fleet of some 2,500 aircraft. An I.A.T.A. state-ment last week said that these companies earned "close on $2,000,000,000" revenue last year, 10 per cent more than in 1953.Traffic results for all I.A.T.A. airlines in 1954 were as follows: Passengers carried 44m (10 per cent increase)K Passenger-miles flown 28,000mCargo ton-miles flown 527.4m (4 per cent increase) Mail ton-miles flown 199m (14 per cent increase) According to the I.A.T.A. statement 1954 was the first year inich more passengers travelled by air across the oceans of the world than by sea. The number of sea passengers between Europeand North America is not yet known, though it is probable that on this route shipping companies continue to carry slightly morethan half the total passenger traffic. Nevertheless, the figures for North Atlantic air travel are most impressive: during 1954the 12 I.A.T.A. airlines on this route carried 580,000 passengers, 7,200 tons of mail and 12,000 tons of cargo on 15,000 flights—"an average of one transatlantic air connection virtually every half hour, day and night, every day of the year."Though healthy in other respects, I.A.T.A. airlines' results are not regarded as satisfactory from a financial viewpoint. SirWilliam Hildred, director-general of I.A.T.A., estimates that the profit margin, on a global basis, is little more than one per cent.The airlines, he points out, are thus extremely vulnerable to the effects of even slight recessions in trade or travel, increases inoperating costs or added governmental taxes or charges. In addition to the total traffic figures issued by I.C.A.O.and I.A.T.A., some individual airlines have released provisional statistics of their operations during 1954.B.E.A. broke all their previous records, carrying 1,825,000 passengers, compared with 1,630,000 in 1953. T.C.A. carried1,429,000 passengers, 9 per cent more than in 1953, and flew 12 per cent more passenger-miles. K.L.M. carried 681,000 passen-gers—a 14 per cent increase—of whom 434,000 flew on tourist services, the proportion of tourist to first-class passengers being53 per cent higher in 1954 than in the previous year. SCHEDULED AIR 1954 1953 1952 1951 1950 1949 1948 1947 1946 1945 1937 1953-54 1947-54 1952-53 1951-52 1050-51 1949-501948-49 1947-48 1946-77 1945-46 Miles flown 1,206 1,156 1,059 976 890 836 789 708 584 373 165 4 4 ^70 + 9 + 9 + 10 + 6+ 6 + 11 + 2157 Pass. 57.8 52.0 45.0 39.9 31.2 26.5 23.5 21 0 18.2 9.3 2.5 TRAFFIC IN 1954—I.C.A.O. STATISTICS 1^3 Pass. miles -ILIII* •minions 32,000 28,580 24,540 21,380 16,960 14,480 12,990 11,740 9,630 5,100 880 Percentage Increc + 11 + 175 + 16 + 13 + 28 + 18 + 13 + 124 15 4 96 + 12 + 172 + 16 + 15 + 26 + 17+ 11 + 11 + 22 + 89 Cargo ton- miles 716 696 668 620 518 390 286 187 82 77 n.a. Mail ton- miles 217 188 175 160 143 128 114 88 67 90 n.a. Av. No. pass. per a/c. 26.5 24.7 23.2 21.9 19.1 17.3 16.5 16.6 16.5 13.7 5.3 Av. miles per pass. 554 551 547 536 544 546 552 559 529 548 350 se or Decrease Between Years •-3 + 283 + 4 + 8 4 20 4 33 + 36 4 51 + 128 + 6 4 16 + 148 + 7 + 12 4 12 + 13 4 30 + 31 -26 + 7 + 60 4 6 + 6 415 + 10+ 5 4 1 + 20 - 1 1 - 1 + 2 -1 -1 -1 + 6 -3 BREVITIES Mot included: U.S.S.R. and the People's Republic of China. -Not available. A SCHEDULED freight service between London and Frank-•**• furt will be inaugurated by Airwork, Ltd., on January 12th. Thereafter an Airwork Viking or Dakota freighter will leaveLondon Airport for Frankfurt every Thursday at 0100 hr, re- turning by 0900 hr on the same day.* * * Five of Pan American's fleet of ten Convair 240s, which areused mainly in the Caribbean area, have been sold to the Brazilian airline V.A.R.I.G. * * * Last October Handley Page announced an order from Queens- land Airlines for an unspecified number of Heralds. A New Zealand journal now reports that the number involved is six. * * * The annual report of Tasman Empire Airways for the financialyear ended March 31st, 1954, shows an operating loss of £146,000. The report states that the ex-B.C.P.A. DC-6s acquired to replaceSolent flying-boats on the trans-Tasman service are operating satisfactorily, and that they should show profitable results. * * •Formerly passenger agent in London for the Canadian Pacific Railway, Mr. P. K. Reynolds has been appointed sales managerfor Canadian Pacific Airlines. He is the first C.P.A. representative to be stationed in London; hitherto the parent company has actedfor the airline. * * * The Boeing Airplane Co. are reported to have quoted 1958as the tentative delivery date for first civil versions of the Boeing 707. The cost of one of these aircraft is reported to be£1,500,000, though spares provisioning would increase this amount by a further £350,000. * * * The amount of freight handled at United Kingdom airports inOctober (8,560 tons) showed an increase of 73 per cent on the total for October 1953. Two reasons are given by the M.T.C.A.for this increase: the continued growth of cross-Channel vehicle ferry traffic and the docks strike. The total number of passengershandled in October was 324,000 (11 per cent increase) and the number of aircraft movements (16,700) went up by 7 per cent. * * * A loss of some £960,000 was incurred by India's State-owneddomestic and regional operator, Indian Airlines Corporation, during the financial year ended July 31st, 1954. The long-hauloperator, Air-India International, which is also State-owned, made a profit of about £200,000 over the same period. Compensationof over £2m is being claimed for former shareholders in Air- India International, Ltd. * * * The Curtiss-Wright Corporation announces an order from PanAmerican for a DC-7B flight simulator, permitting crew training to begin in advance of deliveries. Curtiss-Wright built the originalStratocruiser simulator delivered to PanAm in 1948; in addition the company has built or is building simulators for a variety ofcivil and military aircraft, including the B-52 Convair 340, DC-6B, C-130, B-36, C-124 and Banshee. * * * :'•'.• ;*;•••:.•„.••--••.;, .',••;'."-•.• Hire-purchase air travel, which was first introduced "by P.A.W.A. only eight months ago, is now being offered by 70 otherairlines in the United States alone. B.O.A.C. and B.E.A. followed suit several weeks ago, and the latest European operators to offerdeferred-payment air travel are Hunting-Clan Air Transport, Ltd., and K.L.M. On January 1st PanAm extended their "pay later"plan to residents of the United Kingdom, the minimum deposit being 10 per cent with repayment of the balance over periods ofup to 21 months.
Sign up to
Flight Digital Magazine
Flight Print Magazine
Airline Business Magazine
E-newsletters
RSS
Events
