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Aviation History
1955
1955 - 1766.PDF
16 December 1955 889 OPENING A GATEWAY: The formal inaug- uration of the new central buildings at London Airport is due to be performed today, Decem- ber 16th, by H.M. the Queen. The control tower and the short-haul passenger terminal are now in full use, and the eastern apex building—on extreme right in this "Aerofilms" view—is externally complete. Beverley in Canada ""THE Blackburn and General Aircraft ••- Beverley XB 262 arrived in Canada last week-end for its winterization trials after an uneventful and consistent journey from Brough, via Prestwick, Keflavik and Goose Bay. The flying times for the two trans- atlantic legs were 5 hr 30 min and 10 hr 35 min respectively. From Goose Bay onward to Montreal was completed in 4 hr 10 min, from Montreal to Ottawa in 40 min, Ottawa to Toronto in 1 hr 45 min, Toronto to Winnipeg 5 hr 25 min and Winnipeg to Edmonton 4 hr 45 min. The total distance flown from Brough to Toronto was 5,500 miles. After giving demonstrations at Toronto, Ottawa and Montreal the Beverley—which is the one that carried out tropical trials in North Africa last August—will go to the Central Experimental and Proving Estab- lishment R.C.A.F. Station Rockliffe, whose Climatic Detachment will supervise the cold-weather trials. The aircraft will be evaluated under near-Arctic conditions in terms of servicing, maintenance, function- ing of systems, ease of engine starting and certain performance characteristics. In addition to a crew of 18, the Beverley carried on its outward flight some 13,000 1b of spares and equipment, including a complete Centaurus engine. The crew was a mixed one of R.C.A.F. personnel and English civilian technicians. The captain was S/L. R. H. Janson, with F/L. D. W. Walkey as second pilot and F/O. C. A. Jarvis as navigator. Mr. G. C. Trowbridge ^E learn with regret that Mr. George C. Trowbridge, M.I.M.E., M.I.P.E., managing director of Wickman, Ltd., until February 1954, died on November 28th. Mr. Trowbridge joined the com- pany as deputy managing director in 1944, becoming managing director in 1947. He was a well-known production engineer, and between the wars was for many years production manager of the Gramophone Company, of Hayes. In 1936 he became general manager of the Speke (Liverpool) factory of Rootes Securities, Aircraft Division, but relinquished this position in 1942 to assume the managing directorship of Powderloys, Ltd., of Coventry, a Wickman-associated company. His retirement from business in 1954 was caused through ill- health, for which he was undergoing treatment at the time of his death. He was 67 years of age. .-•••.-. AT THE E.T.P.S. DINNER f>N Thursday of last week the McKenna Dinner was held at *-* the Empire Test Pilots' School, marking the completion of No. 14 course. All the heads of the companies' flight-test depart- ments were there, with the exception of "Bill" Pegg of Bristols, "Ben" Gunn of Boulton Paul, and John Cunningham of de Havilland Aircraft; and, of course, there were the usual dis- tinguished guests from the Ministry of Supply and elsewhere, including Air Chief Marshal Sir John Baker, Controller of Aircraft, M.o.S.; Rear-Admiral W. T. Couchman, Deputy Controller of Aircraft; A.V-M. W. A. Opie, Assistant Controller of Aircraft; Mr. Handel Davies, Scientific Adviser to the Air Ministry; A. Cdre. Ford; G/C. Ring; G/C. D. C. McKinley, Superintendent of Experimental Flying. R.A.E.; G/C. Stewart, Officer Commanding the Institute of Aviation Medicine; W/C. Macdonald; and W/C. J. Finch. After dinner, the E.T.P.S. Commandant, G/C. S. Wroath, ordered the mess secretary, Mr. Setchell, to "bring the) titfer — the mortarboard traditionally worn by the "headmaster on this occasion—and, in fine form, proceeded to deliver an excellent sum- mary of the School's activities. He first welcomed the guests and in mentioning G/C. Stewart and "his merry band of unruffled men" made reference to a certain newspaper story dealing with the "brain barrier." He hoped that the I.A.M. would be success- ful in its programme of "organized confusion." He reported an improvement and extension of the School's flight-test instrumenta- tion equipment, but regretted that this had brought with it an overload of work for the School's chief technical officer, Mr. J. Lang. He suggested that the industry might do well to attach trainee technicians as flight-test engineers at the School tor a period of a year. _ , , G/C. Wroath went on to say that during the past year the School had acquired a Canberra, a Hunter, and a Sea Hawk, and Had received on loan an Avro 707 Delta. In addition the Admiralty had similarly loaned two Gannets, and the Army had provided Maj. I. Walton as an instructor on helicopters. The speaker expressed the hope that the fleet of aircraft would steadily be improved, not so much in numbers, as in different types of modern standard air- craft. The School's 40 pilots had achieved a not inconsiderable total of 5,500 hours' flying during the year, and an E.T.P.S. team had overwhelmingly won the National Gliding Contest team championship. Pupils had included two Americans, two Italians, one Frenchman, one Swede, one Dutchman, eight pilots from the Commonwealth Air Forces, and five from the Fleet Air Arm. G/C. Wroath then called on Air Chief Marshal Sir John Baker to present the McKenna Trophy, for the most outstanding pupil of the course, to Lt. R. E. Moore, U.S. Navy. In his speech, Sir John summarized the work of his department of the Ministry of Supply, stating that its purpose was to see that the aircraft "served the Services." The M.o.S. was working smoothly and he felt that its work was a real contribution to the future of world aviation. He spoke, also, of that approach to a new aircraft which regarded it as a vehicle and a receptacle for a weapons system, with all that the term implied. While guided weapons would undoubtedly be widely used, they would never take over entirely from the manned aircraft, because the latter brought to the point of action another element which the programmed machine could never replace— man's own judgment. Such judgment could certainly be fed into the missile before launching, but the missile would then outrun the judgment, and without it lose a great deal of its effectiveness. Sir John Baker then presented the Trophy to Lt. Moore, who began his speech with "Commandant, Guests and Intruders" and ended with a reference to the friendly rivalry between the Fleet Air Arm and the U.S. Navy, with the toast "here's to the navy with the second biggest carriers . . . and the second best,"
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