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Aviation History
1957
1957 - 0639.PDF
FLIGHT, 10 May 1957 643 One of South African Airways' three DC-7Bs, ZS-DKE "Reiger," seen over Johannesburg. The airline's DC-7fls, which are named after early ships to reach the Cape, are now operating into Amsterdam. A fourth 7B is to be delivered to S.A.A. next year. CIVIL AVIATION MORE ORDERS FROM T.C.A.O PTIONS on 13 Vickers Viscounts and two Douglas DC-8swere taken up last week by Trans-Canada Air Lines. This decision brings the total number of Viscounts ordered by theairline to 51 and that of DC-8s to six. At present 25 Viscounts are in T.C.A. service and four moreare to be delivered in May. Deliveries will be continued in December of this year until completion of the order by June19,58. The DC-8 deliveries are expected to begin late in 1959 and these machines will operate on the long-range transatlanticand trans-continental routes in 1960. The current total of Viscounts sold to the dollar market is now147. In addition to the T.C.A. aircraft 75 are for Capital Airlines and 15 for Continental Air Lines, while six are executive versions.This recent T.C.A. order is valued at some $17m (£6m). V.O.R. BEACONS IN BRITAIN J"\ETAILS of the extended programme for the installation of*-' V.H.F. omni-range navigation beacons in the United King- dom are given in M.T.C.A. Information Circular No. 40/1957(Teh. 13/57). The new notice takes account of revised and planned airways alignments, and indicates that V.O.R. sites willbe established at 15 locations. The first six of these to come into operation will be at Clacton, Strumble, Chertsey, Prestwick,Bristol and Dungeness, all of which should be established during the second half of this year. The existing V.O.R. installation atLlanwinio is to be retained until operational service is available from Strumble. Between December 1958 to May 1959 further installationsare scheduled to come into operation, at Dover, Halifax, Daventry, Wallasey, Kintyre and the Isle of Man, followed in the periodMay to December 1959, by others at Seaford, Hum (Ibsley), and Renfrew. THE BLACKBUSHE VIKING ACCIDENT QUESTIONS in Parliament concerning the present system ofair trooping followed the accident to Viking G-AJBO of Eagle Aviation at Blackbushe on the night of May 1, in which 33people were killed. The aircraft, carrying 30 passengers and a crew of five, crashed while making an emergency return to theairfield shortly after taking off for Lyons and Idris, Libya, on a flight under charter to the War Office. This was Eagle's firstaccident involving injury to passengers. In the House of Commons on May 2 the Under-Secretary forAir, Mr. Orr Ewing, announced that a public inquiry would be held. Mr. Geoffrey de Freitas asked for a re-examination of "theserious charges which have been made in the House in the last year or two against the present system of air trooping," and Mr.Herbert Morrison criticized the Governments "bias against the use of public corporation aircraft." The Prime Minister repeatedthat there would be a full public inquiry into this particular acci- dent and said that the wider issues would be looked into. U.S. AIR SAFETY PLANR ECENTLY recommended by the Engineering Group of Presi-dent Eisenhower's Aviation Facilities Planning Commission is a new plan for air traffic control in the U.S.A. It includesproposals for the immediate future, gradual modernization and improvements by 1960, and an entirely new system by 1967. Immediate proposals are that (1) the present A.T.C. expansionprogramme, involving more radar equipment and more personnel, should be accelerated; (2) a group should be formed within theCivil Aeronautics Administration to analyse current air traffic bottlenecks; (3) all traffic above 18.000ft should be placed underthe direction of A.T.C. centres; and (4) certain high-density routes should be expanded by establishing one-way airways,separated according to aircraft speeds. According to the new plan, 85 per cent of all commercial,military and private traffic would eventually be brought into con- trolled airspace—compared with the average of 12 per cent ofpresent traffic which is under Federal air traffic control. By 1965, it is suggested, all traffic above 10,000ft would be operating incontrolled airspace. A large-scale research programme is recommended. Cost-ing up to $40m per year, it would involve the development of new electronic, navigation and communications devices and themodernization of airport runways to permit the speedier handling of traffic. The Group emphasizes that A.T.C. research should be underthe control of one authority such as the proposed Airways Modernization Board. The eventual establishment of a centralgroup to determine national aviation policy is recommended. BRAZILIAN FRIENDSHIP PRODUCTION LAST year we referred to a Fokker statement that licence agree-' ments to build the Friendship had been negotiated with Breguet in Europe and Fokker's associate company IndustriaAeronautica of Rio de Janeiro. It is now reported that the Brazilian Government has been participating in a further agree-ment between the Brazilian Fokker company and its parent for the construction of a batch of 100 Friendships, part of which,it is said, will be purchased by the government to replace older piston-engined aircraft used to fly cargo and mail on governmentservices in the interior. Other Friendships built by the Brazilian Fokker concern, will, it is further understood, be sold to Braziliancommercial operators. The Brazilian production line will probably not be in fulloperation until 1959. In the meantime Friendships will be building at Amsterdam and at the Fairchild plant at Hagerstown.Under their agreement with Fokker, Fairchild are able to sell Friendships in all North and South American countriesexcept Brazil. BRISTOL'S NEW AIRPORT LOCATED eight miles from Bristol on the main Bristol-Exeter' road, the city's new airport at Lulsgate Bottom was formally opened by the Duchess of Kent on Wednesday, May 1. Con-gratulating the city on its enterprise, Her Royal Highness recalled that the first Bristol Airport, at Whitchurch, had been openedby her husband, the late Duke of Kent, in May 1930. Whitchurch, requisitioned during the war and forming theonly war-time civil air outlet from the United Kingdom, had been found unsuitable for post-war expansion and development. Whileit had in fact continued to serve as Bristol's airport during the post-war years, negotiations had been proceeding for the sale Corporation personalities in the news: (left) W/C. R. A. C. Brie, who— as noted last week—retired last month after ten years as official-in- charge of B.E.A.'s Helicopter Experimental Unit; (centre) Capt. J. A. Cameron, with over 3,400 hours on helicopters, who has succeeded W/C. Brie; and (right) Capt. Bernard Frost, flight captain of the B.O.A.C. DC-7C Fleet, who logged his 500th Atlantic crossing on May 2.
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