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Aviation History
1958
1958 - 0802.PDF
818 FLIGHT CIVIL AVIATION... B.K.S. Elizabethan Zulu Whiskey at Fles- land Airport, Bergen, on its inaugural flight from Woolsington. A new control tower (left) and terminal building are under construction. B.K.S. Inaugurate a New Service from Newcastle TO NORWAY TWICE A WEEK WITH three Ambassadors now on their fleet, the independ-ent operators B.K.S. have acquired enhanced status. Offer-ing modern equipment on their international service is unquestionably giving the airline a competitive boost. TheAmbassador operation has presented quite a challenge to B.K.S., and the operational and engineering staffs have tackled the taskwith enthusiasm. High praise on every hand is forthcoming for B.E.A.J who have backed their sale of the three aircraft with thefullest possible technical co-operation. B.K.S. encountered some difficulties with spares provisioning in the early weeks of theiroperations (B.E.A.'s Viscount 700 spar modifications meant that the Corporation also had an extended call on Elizabethan spares)but with help from de Havilland these are now being resolved. Elizabethans in B.K.S. service remain substantially unmodifiedfrom the form in which they were operated by B.E.A. New colour schemes have been devised (the latest of these is shown in theheading photograph), but the Union Jack on the central fin is retained, and so is the plaid finish of the cabin walls. But majorchanges have been made to the interior layout so that 55 seats, five-abreast with a central aisle, can be accommodated in place ofthe 47 first-class or 49 tourist seats with which B.E.A.'s aircraft were equipped. This has been made possible by pruning about800 lb from the B.E.A. Elizabethan's equipped weight. Special non-adjustable seats, designed by B.K.S. in associationwith Aviation Traders and manufactured for them by Flying Services, Ltd., at Chesham, are fitted to the seat rails at a pre-determined pitch. The new seats are particularly light—the triple unit weighs only 42 lb—and are more than adequately comfort-able for the stage-lengths over which the airline operates. Each seat, which is _ upholstered in plastic foam covered in washablepatterned Vynide, incorporates a folding tray and pocket in the back. This work is the responsibility of Benson Aircraft Up-holsterers, Ltd., whose works are adjacent to those of B.K.S. at Southend. A second major weight-saving was achieved by fittingMallinson bonded L72 sheet and end-grain balsa sandwich floors— an expedient that has already paid dividends on B.K.S.'s DC-3s.The savings achieved make it practical for the aircraft to carry a spares pack on international flights. The Elizabethan—the Corporation's fleet name is retained byB.K.S.—has been introduced this year on the company's routes from Newcastle to Basle, Dublin and Jersey; Newcastle to Belfast,via Edinburgh; Newcastle - London - Bilbao - Santander and, as from June 4, from Newcastle to Bergen. The routes to Belfast,Bergen, Basle and London are new this year. The London service, which is operated only on Saturdays, is the first revival of a servicethat was operated daily from Newcastle's Woolsington Airport to L.A.P. by Hunting-Clan Viscounts before it was withdrawn at theend of 1956. It proved popular enough with Tyneside business- men to warrant a careful exploration of the possibilities of a similarservice by B.K.S., but the necessity of devoting one aircraft to one return trip each way a day affords too low a utilization to make theservice economical with the present route pattern, and the present Saturday service is incidental to the Newcastle - Bilbao flight.Nevertheless, B.K.S. now have a fleet of sufficient size to give them some capacity to spare, and with suitable routes they estimatethat they could find another 1,000 hr work annually for their fleet of three Elizabethans and three DC-3s. The new B.K.S. service between Newcastle and Bergen is alogical air extension of a popular tourist shipping route, the towns being well connected commercially and sentimentally; a Christmastree from Bergen is erected in Newcastle every year. The airline's market research has shown that a useful potentialof air traffic exists both in what might be called the greater Tyne- side area and in Northern Ireland, and their sales promotion isbeing directed towards exploiting the idea that Stavanger, Alesund, Oslo and T0nsberg—indeed, most of Norway and much ofScandinavia—can be reached in one day even from Northern Ireland. The airline anticipates some very hard work before mak-ing the service into a profitable operation, particularly in this first year, but they are being greatly helped by the genuine enthusiasmand hard work of Braathens S.A.F.E., who are the B.K.S. general agents in Norway. S.A.S. flights from Bergen and the BraathensLuftbuesen air-bus service provide connections northwards to Alesund and Trondheim, eastwards to Oslo and Stockholm andto Stavanger, Kristiansand and T0nsberg. Advertising of the service in Norway is being got under way, and the British Traveland Holidays Association in Scandinavia is also lending energetic support to the venture. Although scheduled as a summer service, weekly at first, twiceweekly on Wednesdays and Fridays from June 20 until September 12, there is a prospect of either a weekly winter Newcastle - Bergenservice or a regular charter to winter holidaymakers and ski clubs; there is a confirmed tradition of travel to Scandinavia in the Northof England and in Northern Ireland. B.K.S. are disappointed that—although not members of I.A.T.A.—they had to adopt a fare at I.A.T.A. level on this international route; they would have preferred to offer a fare that was morenearly competitive with the shipping company rates. They do, however, offer a 23-day excursion fare that costs £6 4s less than thenormal return fare of £27 15s. The first inaugural flight to Bergen on June 4 was arranged todemonstrate the possibilities of leaving Northern Ireland at a civilized hour and yet arriving in Norway with plenty of time inhand to make onward connections. Lady Wakehurst, wife of the Governor of Northern Ireland, boarded a B.K.S. Elizabethan inBelfast at 10.30 hr, before joining the deputy Lord Mayor of Newcastle, Councillor Brigadier H. I. Branson, the Earl of Tanker-ville and his daughter and the remainder of the party at a civic reception by the Lord Mayor of Newcastle at Woolsington Airport.;The journey to Bergen, which Flight was able to sample, was ' made in comfortably less time than the scheduled 2^ hr. A Nor-wegian-speaking stewardess is carried on each flight, on which an English salad lunch or Norwegian sm0rrebr0d is served. Com-pletely without fuss, pomp or untoward incident of any kind, the return flight was made three hours later. The operation has been -shown to work very smoothly—now the hard commercial work oJ bringing in the traffic must begin. A. T. P. A saving of 800 Ib in equipped weight has made it possible to instal' 55 seats in the popular high-wing Elizabethan. The B.K.S. motif may in future be used only on alternate head-rest covers.
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