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Aviation History
1959
1959 - 1517.PDF
734 FLIGHT Flight to MOSCOW PART II Operational Background to B.E.A.'s New Service by J. M. RAMSDEN *"*'• HERE, to follow up last week's review of the commercial aspects of the new B.E.A.-Aeroflot service, is a report from Moscow about the opera- tional background. The author accompanied the second inaugural Viscount 806 service Moscow, May 17V NUKOVO AIRPORT is full of surprises. Just who, wewondered, was that straw-hatted Chinese in the hall of the terminal building, carrying a pair of antlers under one armand a bouquet of flowers under the other? And was it usual for arriving Tu-104s to taxi right up to the terminal entrance todisgorge their passengers, and then to be towed away by a lorry? Was the mighty array of Tu-104s and Il-18s (we lost count after25 and 10 respectively) commonplace? What is the explanation of the curiously herbal smell of the Moscow air? These and many other inscrutabilities have to be accepted here —just like Moscow's freak thunderstorms. One which was fore- cast while we were en route fortunately abated without delaying our arrival. But it delayed our B.E.A. reception party, whose car was stopped by an "onslaught of hailstones as big as cricket balls." A pleasant surprise was the agreement among B.EJV.'s people here, with only apparently minor reservations, about Russian help- fulness towards the British, and towards B.E.A. in particular. You have only to glance through the Russian A.I.P. (air informa-tion publication) to appreciate how far east-west civil aviation relations have now advanced. Eighteen months ago Russian opera-tional procedures were virtually a closed book, except for the rudimentary information gathered from the occasional specialflight—always accompanied by Russian crews—of R.A .F. Trans- port Command. Now B.E.A.'s captains have in their briefcases a route book,prepared in the standard Aerad format by International Aeradio Ltd., as an extension of the Scandinavian Section (D) of thefamiliar Flight Guide. This route book tells B.E.A. crews all they need to know about airways rules and procedures. Of particularinterest is the Aerad Radio Navigation Chart, from which the map below has been adapted. As yet the customary Aeradapproach and landing charts have not been prepared, but they will be available after B.E.A. report on final details followingthe inaugural services. In the meantime the information is avail- able to B.E.A. pilots on clearly intelligible bi-lingual chartsprovided by the Russians. When presented with copies of Aerad's radio navigation chartsfor the London - Moscow route, the Chief of the Russian A.I.S. inquired whether copies could be produced by Aerad in Russianfor use by Aeroflot crews. Aerad took up the challenge; the first chart covering the sector Riga - Moscow is now in productionand copies are to be sent to die Russian A.I.S. for trial by Aeroflot crews. This can be regarded as quite a bouquet for the Aeradcartographer-editors, who of course worked entirely from informa- The map below and the table on the right refer to route facilities along the compulsory air corridor into Vnukovo Airport, Moscow. Control centres governing the operation of flights are at Riga and Moscow and the boundary separating the two F.I.R.s is just to the east of Velikiye Luki. The non-directional beacons are claimed to have o minimum effective range of 100 miles tion supplied by the Russians. Aeroflot, incidentally, raisedno objection to the fact that the Russian Section of the Aerad Flight Guide is available to anyone who wants it. The Chief of the Russian A.I.S. was also handed an inscribedpresentation set of Aerad's ultraphaned topographical map panels for the route Moscow - London. He was both impressed anddelighted and immediately asked Aerad to prepare a trial set of similar map panels covering the Aeroflot route Moscow - Rangoon. The information which, so to speak, ends up on the chartroomtables of B.E.A.'s Viscounts is sent by the Russian aeronautical information service (known to them as it is to us, by the initialsA.I.S.) of the U.S.S.R. Civil Air Fleet. The information enters Britain via Pinner, home of the Ministry of Transport and CivilAviation's A.I.S. Pinner's first official communication was a Notam-U.S.S.R. dated January 7, 1958. This piece of paper wasquite historic, for it signified that the Russians were supplying not only the information, but were doing so in the manner and formatrecommended for international usage by the International Civil Aviation Organization. The subject of the Notam (this word,derived of course from the English "Notice to Airmen," now seems to be part of the Russian vocabulary) was the announcementthat Kubinka airport, 64 km from Moscow Vnukovo and formerly a military base, could now be used by B.E.A. as an alternative.During 1958, so it is said, about 100 Notams—Class Is and Class Us—were received at Pinner. Then, about a month ago, as noted above, the A.I.P. arrived.This event was described by a Ministry official as "a fantastic breakthrough." The document, in English and Russian, andformally entitled Aerodromes and Radio Navigation Information Guide, conformed closely to the I.C.A.O.-prescribed format—with the exception of the AGA section (aerodromes and ground aids), though the necessary basic AGA information has been sup-plied. The A.I.P. contained 80 pages, and—as one B.E.A. official said-—it was evidence not only of eagerness to co-operate but ofwillingness to learn also. This document, from which International Aeradio have pre-pared B.E.A/s route book, is the operational bible of the Moscow service. The procedures are clearly explained in good English,and they must of course be rigidly adhered to—as the following extract from the Rules of Flight indicates: — "17. Deviation from the boundaries of the air corridor while crossingthe State border of the U.S.S.R. or from the prescribed airway when flying within the territory of the Soviet Union is categorically prohibited."18. If the crew of a foreign aircraft is uncertain as to whether they are correctly carrying out the flight instructions, they must contact theappropriate Air Traffic Control Service of the U.S.S.R. Civil Air Fleet and request to be told their position. "19. In the event a foreign aircraft diverges from its route the A.T.C.unit providing control of its movements renders all possible assistance to lead the aircraft back to the prescribed route but does not guaranteethe safety of the flight of this aircraft outside the route and bears no responsibility whatever for this flight." Moscow-Kubinka Minsk RigaRjaian Runway 045/225 120/300 150/330 065/245 Length X Width 8,20Oft x 260ft 5,900ft X 197ft 5.570ft X 164ft 8,200ft X 262ft Surface Concrete Bitumen Concrete Concrete Route beacon (N.D.B) A Control centre -^- B.E..A, aliernau Main B.E.A corridors as 44. To Warsaw MOSCOW (Vnukovo) Serpukhov RJAZAN MINSK
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