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Aviation History
1961
1961 - 0451.PDF
No 2718 VOLUME 79 THURSDAY 13 APRIL 1961 Editor-in-Chief MAURICE A. SMITH DFC Editor H. F. KING HBE Technical Editor W. T. GU NSTON Air Transport Editor <i. M. RAMSDEN Production Editor ROY CASEY Managing Director H. N. PRIAULX MBE IN THIS ISSUE From All Quarters 46O Missiles and Spaceflight 462 Flight System Survey 464 Straight and Level 465 Correspondence 466 Air Commerce 467 Service Aviation 470 World Airlines Survey (special feature): Britain's New Board 471 Airline Scheduled Traffic 474 The British Carriers 477 The World's Airlines 481 Airport Charges 514 Ililtc 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 NewYork, NY. Branch Offices Coventry: 8-10 Corpora-tion Street; telephone Coventry 25210. Birmingham: King Edward House, NewStreet, 2; telephone Midland 7191. Man- chester: 260 Deansgate 3; telephoneBlackfrjars 4412 or Deansgate 3595. Glasgow: 62 Buchanan Street Cl; tele-phone Central 1265-6. New York, NY: Thomas Skinner & Co(Publishers) Ltd. Ill Broadway 6; telephone Digby 9-1197. © Iliffe Transport Publications Ltd.1961. 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 1939 Swings and Roundabouts ARGUMENTS that more traffic for Britain's independent airlines will meannew orders for British aircraft are reasonable enough. British United, for example, are not just "electioneering" when they talk about orders for new aircraft; they genuinely intend to buy new British jets if they get the new routes they want. They will have to buy them if they are to compete. But the size of Britain's traffic plum-cake will not magically increase when the independents are granted a share. If more slices are given to the inde- pendents it is possible that BOAC and BEA may find themselves with a surplus of aircraft, and may have to cancel some of their VC10 and Trident orders. Neither corporation has ever actually suggested this possibility in public—at least, not until a BBC Television programme during Easter, a feature which dealt quite admirably with the UK domestic transport scene. In an interview with the BBC air correspondent, BEA's chairman. Lord Douglas, said: "If the independents take away our traffic we will find ourselves with a surplus of aircraft." Might this mean, he was asked, cancellations of aircraft? "It may mean that," replied Lord Douglas. The aircraft industry would not lose—roughly the same number of auto- pilots, instruments, engines, airframes and so on would come out of its fac- tories. Would it gain ? Perhaps not, at first, in terms of quantity production. But it might well benefit—if we might be forgiven for using jargon—from plurality of native-user demand and the broader specification-writing that would result. DH 125 In these days any civil aircraft project gets the green light only after most earnest peerings into the miasma of the present and the obscurity of the future. Thus, in deciding to produce a de Havilland executive jet—the DH 125, announced overleaf—the Hawker Siddeley Group have been guided by several years of market research. The new project is a major one, involving an investment of several million pounds and to be initiated with a batch of 30 aircraft. DH mean business. In their favour they have Hawker Siddeley's resources, a long and strongly established marketing and servicing organization, and a shining reputation for building and selling executive aeroplanes. They intend to build the Type 125 quickly and cheaply—and with a confidence that was expressed by Sir Roy Dobson in a recent Flight interview with Frank Beswick. Asked why he thought Britain could get a market for an executive jet when the Americans have already gone so far, he replied: "I believe they have largely missed the boat. We can sell a machine at about two-thirds of their cost and one with better performance." But the contenders are no longer confined to Lockheed and North American. A strong bid is coming from Switzerland, with the Swiss American Aviation Corporation's Execujet, a type which should be available at about the same time as the DH 125 and at an estimated price, complete with equipment, of about $325,000. And this is no small-time opera- tion, for SAAC intend to build 75 in 1963, 100 in 1964, 125 in 1965, 150 in 1966, and 175-200 in 1967. Further indicative of what DH are up against is the likelihood that the Execujet's undercarriage will be made in Japan. Such are the facts of life today. But in facing facts de Havilland have 40-odd years' experience, and in the Hawker Siddeley Group a sponsor used to tack- ling all comers on their own terms.
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