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Aviation History
1961
1961 - 0001.PDF
No 27 04 VOLU ME 7 9 FRIDAY 6 JANUARY 1961 Editor-in-Chief IAURICE A. SMITH DFC Editor H . F. KING MBE Technical Editor W. T. GUNSTON Production Editor ROY CASEY Managing Director H . N. PRIAULX MBE 1 IN THIS ISSUE From All Quarters 2 Missiles and Spaceflight 4 New Year Honours 6 The New Shape of the Industry 7 Arresting RN Aircraft 9 Minuteman 12 Straight and Level 15 Sport and Business 16 Flight System Survey 17 - Vickers' Golden I Jubilee 18 Air Commerce 31 Service Aviation 36 Correspondence 37 Iliffe Transport Publications Ltd, DorsetHouse, Stamford Street, London SE1: telephone Waterloo 3333. TelegramsFlightpres London SE1. Annual sub- scriptions: Home £4 15s. Overseas £5.Canada and USA $15.00. Second Class Mail privileges authorized at New-York, NY. Branch Offices Coventry: K-10 Corpora-tion Street; telephone 'Coventry 25210. Birmingham: King Edward Bouse. New-Street. 2: telephone Midland 7101. Man- chester: 260 Deansgati- :i; telephoneBlackfriars 4412 or Deansgate 3595. Glasgow: 62 Buchanan Street Cl; tele-phone Central 126f>-6. New York, NY : Thomas Skinner & Co(Publishers) Ltd. Ill Broadway 6; telephone Digby 9-1197. © Ilifle Transport Publications Ltd,1901. Permission to reproduce illustra- tions and letterpress can be granted onlyunder written agreement. Brief extracts or comments may be made with dueacknowledgement. AIRCRAFT, SPACECRAFT, MISSILES Official Organ of the Royal Aero Club First Aeronautical Weekly in the World Founded 1909 Regulation 10(15)M ORE encouraging than the uninspiring constitution of our new Air Transport Licensing Board is the fact that its hearings, due to begin next month, will be held in public. Like a court of law, the board has properly been given the right to hold hearings in private at its discretion; but it is to be hoped that the exercise of this discretion will be as rare as the occasions on which its predecessor, the Air Transport Advisory Council, decided not to hold hearings in private. In all its eleven years the ATAC never once opened its doors in Dean's Yard to the public. It is to be hoped, too, that one of the regulations concerning the new board's public accountability will be changed. This particular regulation, 10(15), pre- scribes that all hearings shall be recorded, but that transcripts shall be made available only if "any party to the case before the board shall so require." This means that the only way in which our airline industry and other interested parties can keep in touch with the proceedings is to be present at all hearings. This is quite unreasonable. There will be many occasions when, say, the commercial manager of ABC Airways will want to follow proceedings to which he is not a party; but in order to do so he must find the time to attend in person. Similar inconvenience will be suffered by the Press; and even people who have actually attended a hearing will often, if not invariably, want to refer back to something that was said. Only if transcripts of all hearings are fully and promptly made available as a matter of course can our air-transport industry derive full benefit from the fact that hearings before the board will be in open court. Regulation 10(15) is public accountability at half-cock, and it ought to be changed before the board's first hearings next month. Professionals OnlyW ITH the disbandment of the remaining Fighter Control Units at the end of January, the Royal Auxiliary Air Force will no longer play a part in the defence of the United Kingdom. The "bright sword" to which we referred in an article on the disbandment of the RAuxAF fighter squadrons (Flight, March 8, 1957) has been finally sheathed; for the Air Ministry has decided that with a reduction in manpower needs, following reorganization of the control and report- ing system and introduction of new air-defence techniques, the employment of auxiliaries is "no longer justified." This is a hard decision for the hundreds of men and women who have so faithfully and skilfully manned the FCUs, and it loosens still further the links binding the Royal Air Force to local areas, the cities and counties whose names were part of unit insignia. Sad though all this is, however, the fact remains that early-warning techniques are now so complex as to be more and more a matter for professionals; and if the Air Ministry is satisfied that it can manage without part- time manpower, the decision to close down the FCUs seems to be an inescapable one. It is to be hoped, though, that the volunteer spirit will not be entirely snuffed out. How valuable such a spirit can be in times of emergency has been brilliantly demonstrated in the brief but proud history of the Royal Auxiliary Air Force, particularly during the Second World War.
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