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Aviation History
1958
1958 - 0177.PDF
PLIGHT, 7 February 1958 " 187 CIVIL AVIATION Lost week de Havilland issued this picture, the first impression of the D.H.121, the Rolls- Royce-powered aircraft chosen by B.E.A. for its first-line equipment in the sixties. A round-up of the controversy surrounding the placing of an order appears on page 167; relevant points from the Commons debate appear on page 174. RACING SCHEDULES T>LACING of the Britannia into transatlantic service lastA December resulted in much discussion on this side of the Atlantic on the ethical and operational aspects of "optimistic"scheduling. Outside the U.S. there is no body authorized to check the realism of published timetables, the twin controllingforces of competition on the one hand, and public opinion on the other, apparently being considered to suffice. A quick inspec-tion of B.O.A.C. timetables suggests that, at least as far as the Britannia is concerned, schedules are well within average opera-tional limits, and flight-times might even allow for a proportion of "built-in delay" at take-off. In contrast to this, American domestic trunk carriers are nowbeing charged by the C.A.B. with offering to the public timetables "which are not reasonably accurate and do not bear a realisticrelationship to actual performance." The list of respondents includes American, Capital, Delta, National, T.W.A. and United.Domestic trunks excluded are Braniff, Eastern, Northeast, North- west and Western.The basis of the C.A.B. case is that this practice is "unfair and deceptive" rather than "unrealistic." Validity of the C.A.B.'s evi-dence will no doubt be contested. But whatever emerges, the Board's action is a reminder of its duty as a watchdog for thecustomer, a function which surely needs fulfilling in the inter- national sphere. VERTOL HELICOPTER AIRLINE IF New York Airways obtain C.A.B. approval they may become,in April, the first commercial operators of a tandem-rotor heli- copter. Mr. Robert L. Cummings, Jnr., N.Y.A.'s president,announced on January 30 that his company had decided (as fore- cast in Flight, December 20) to purchase five Vertol 44Bs (poweredby 1,425 h.p. Wright Cyclones) to replace the two Sikorsky S-55s that have been their standard equipment since 1952 and the threeS-58s which were added in 1956. The value of N.Y.A.'s order is £715,000 with spares; the firstaircraft will be delivered from the Vertol Aircraft Corporation in Morton, Pennsylvania, in April, three in May and the final one inJune. The Sikorsky fleet, complete with tools and spares, is being offered as a package sale by William C. Wold Associates of NewYork, together with consulting and training assistance from New York Airways personnel. When the new fleet is available N.Y.A. will operate a new time- table with increased frequencies; a route evaluation with a Vertol 44was made last autumn. The service between New York's airports and the West Thirtieth Street terminal will be stepped up, andthe number of services to Westchester and Stamford, Connecticut, may be increased as well. New equipment should give N.Y.A. theopportunity of meeting a steady demand for helicopter travel in the New York area, and they claim that their subsidy requirementwill be reduced as well. PANAM IS USING DOPPLER A DC-7C of Pan American is being used for evaluation of the•*• General Precision Laboratories Radan Doppler navigator on regular transatlantic service between New York and London.Eighteen crossings have so far been made with this first civilian application of Doppler. Radan is reported to weigh 89 lb, and to use a four-beam "Janus"system, combined with a compass for sensing groundspeed, drift and heading. Only these values are found, no computer beingadded to provide other navigational information. It is also stated that the system operates successfully over water, snow or ice. Comprehensive Doppler navigation equipment has been instandard R.A.F. service for over three years and several hundred U.S.A.F. and U.S. Navy aircraft carry it. Both Marconi andDecca are developing civil Doppler navigators, respectively desig- nated AD.2300 and D.I.A.N. The latter is integrated with theDecca Navigator and Dectra. AMERICAN AIRLINES1 PROFITS HALVED PRELIMINARY accounts for 1957 must make depressing read-ing to the 50,000-odd shareholders in the world's largest carrier, American Airlines. That profits would fall was predicted in the1956 annual report ". . . increases in revenues projected for the year may not equal increases in cost of production. If not, therewill be a further reduction in profit margin." Recent pleas by American to the C.A.B. for a 15 per cent fare increase must haveled shareholders to brace themselves. But to learn that net profits had fallen from $16.9m to $10.9m must still have come as a severeshock. Financial figures for 1957 are unaudited and preliminary, butcomparison of American Airlines' past preliminary figures with their subsequent final accounts suggests that they are reliable.The broad picture is that total revenues have increased by only five per cent (from $291.8m to $306.0m) while total costs havegrown by as much as eight per cent (from $273.8m to $296.9m). Profit on sale of aircraft has increased slightly from $1.5m to $1.8m.As regards revenues, that from passenger traffic increased by only four per cent. Mail revenue showed little change, while thatfor freight and "other" increased respectively by 9 per cent and 21 per cent.On the cost side, direct and indirect costs each rose by 13 per cent, representing additional outgoings of $31m. Obsolescenceand depreciation—a dubious item when in an unaudited form— appears to have been increased by $3m, while interest and miscel-laneous charges, previously a substantial credit item, in 1957 cost $32,209 net. Against these cost increases, federal income tax pro-vision fell from $19.4m to $8.3m. Prospects for 1958 are probably more hopeful as last year'sresults were depressed by delivery of 19 DC-7Cs and two DC-6Bs at a cost approaching $50m. Although this year will see no addi-tions to American's fleet (the next deliveries being 35 Electras from January 1959, and 30 Boeing 707s from March 1959) progresspayments on $240m worth of equipment will be considerable. Another costly item will be interest on the two loans negotiatedwith insurance companies to reimburse Boeing and Lockheed. The annual interest charge will amount to over $5m. Hearing completion at Fairchild's Hagerstown plant is the first licence- built Fokker F.27 Friendship. See news paragraph on page 188.
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