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Aviation History
1961
1961 - 0644.PDF
654 FLIGHT, 18 May 1961 FROM ALL QUARTERS BAC-lll and Spey AS intimated last week, British Aircraft Corporation have nowreleased preliminary details of the BAC-lll short-haul jetliner, and announce an order for ten (plus five on option) from BritishUnited, and a letter of intent for five from Ozark. Details are given on pages 673-674 of this issue. Powerplant of the BAC-lll is the Rolls-Royce Spey, and manynew details of this important engine will be found in a review of Rolls-Royce aircraft gas turbines which begins on page 667. Roy Ewans Resigns CHIEF designer and an executive director of A. V. Roe & Co Ltd,Mr J. R. Ewans is to resign at the end of this month. No reason has yet been given, but Mr Ewans is reported as saying that he has madehis decision "for purely personal reasons," and that there had been no disagreement between himself and the company. Avro said lastweekend that they would be unable to comment until the end of this week. Mr Ewans, who joined the company as chief aerodynamicist in1949, was responsible for development of the Mk 2 Vulcan and the Avro 748. Latterly he has been working on the 761 project, a twin-Spey medium-range airliner developed from the 771 and compar- able with the BAC-lll. HSG Link with Germany IT was announced on May 15 that the Hawker Siddeley Group'srepresentation in Common Market countries is to be greatly strengthened by an extension of a previous agreement betweenHawker Siddeley Aviation and the Otto Wolf steel and engineering group of Cologne. Not only is this aviation link to be expanded,but Otto Wolf will now work with Hawker Siddeley Industries in a trading association covering "a wide range of products." It is relevant to note HSG's existing agreements with SEREB(Paris) for space research, Focke-Wulf (Bremen), an indirect link through Bristol Siddeley with Klockner-Humboldt-Deutz on aeroengines and a government-to-government agreement to evolve a V/STOL tactical aeroplane based on the Hawker P. 1127. World's Busiest Air Route TODAY, May 18, was due to be the last day of the Air TransportLicensing Board's hearings into Cunard Eagle's application for a North Atlantic service. Just published by the International CivilAviation Organization are some remarkable facts about traffic on this route during 1960. The North Atlantic experienced the largestregional increase in passenger traffic in the world, carrying 395,000 more passengers on scheduled flights than in 1959, for a total of1,761,000. With charter and special flights, the total becomes 1,920,000—an increase of 25 per cent over the previous year's1,540,000. This increase accounts for about 30 per cent of the year's overall increase in international passenger traffic. Within the last three years North Atlantic passenger traffic hasnearly doubled, from 1,020,000 in 1957 to 1.920,000 in 1960. Sea travellers now constitute less than one-third of the whole NorthAtlantic passenger traffic. Maytime Toreadors FOR five days and nights last week Britain was under air attack."Enemy" forces were aircraft of Bomber Command, USAF, RCAF, French Air Force and RAF Germany; defenders wereFighter Command and the Fleet Air Arm. This was Exercise Matador, an annual test of the country's defences and early-warning radar. Nuclear fall-out was simulated, and 15,000 members of the Royal Observer Corps gave up their weekend to practisereporting procedures. For the professionals, especially the fighter pilots, such exercisesmay entail periods of inactivity. No attacks came in the first 90 hours of the alert and at Leconfleld, where a Flight staff memberhad the privilege of visiting 19 Sqn, most of Friday was spent at a 2hr state of readiness which went down to half an hour when a bigenemy force was reported off Norway. For 50min pilots sweltered in their cockpits awaiting telebrief instructions; then the emergency SWIVELLING NOZZLES of the Bristol Siddeley BSS3 Pegasus are ex- plained by Dr S. G. Hooker, technical director (aero), to a visiting group from the Royal Swedish Air Force Board headed by their chief, Gen L. G. H. Thunberg. Also in the picture are Sir Arnold Hall, managing director of Bristol Siddeley (right), Dr R. C. Plumb, an assistant chief engineer (fourth from the left) and Col S. L. Flodin (third from left), one of the Swedish visitors to Patchway OFF GROUND AGAIN after twenty years: the historic £.28/39 is lifted to its new "hangar" in London (see "Gloster-Whittle Anniversary") died away, and as the squadron's blue-and-white checkerboard fk°fluttered intermittently in a soft evening breeze, immersion-suited crews sat around on the grass listening to tape-recorded jazz. Buiin the early hours of Saturday morning the squadron's Hunter F.6s and the Javelin FAW.4s of 72 Sqn were scrambled. Interceptionswere claimed and during that day some of the aircraft operated from three different airfields: with Leconfield subjected to nuclear fall-outthey landed at Middleton St George and later went into Leuchars The C-in-C Fighter Command, Air Marshal Sir Hector Me-Gregor, stood down his command at 0925 last Monday after the last of six raids had occurred and a maximum scramble been mounted.Most interceptions in Matador were made well out to sea; the Continental warning system had worked well and serviceability wasgood on both sides. Rotodyne Order Report Denied INVITED by Flight to comment on a London newspaper story lastweek that "the RAF is to buy 12 Rotodynes at a cost of up to £lm each to airlift the Army" and that "British European Airwa\sis to take a further six Rotodynes," a Westland spokesman said that the assertion was a speculative one. No Ministry orders hadbeen received, but the company was about to tender for the suppK of an initial 12 Rotodynes which would be operated by RAFTransport Command for the Army in troop-carrying, freighting and casualty-evacuation roles. Though technical talks had beenheld with BEA from time to time, there had been no contractual discussion. Gloster-Whittle Anniversary LAST Monday, May 15. was the 20th anniversary of the first flightof the Gloster-Whittle E.28/39—Britain's, and almost the worlds. first jet aircraft (a Heinkel Hel78, turbojet-powered, had flown onAugust 27, 1939). During 1939 Mr W. G. Carter, Gloster's chief designer from 1936 to 1948, was invited by the Air Ministry todesign a jet-propelled aircraft, to be powered by the Whittle W.I engine. By April 1941 the first of two prototypes, number W404I.was ready for taxying trials; and at Cranwell on May 15 it was flown, for 7min, by the late Jerry Sayer. The story of these eventshas often been told, but one point in particular which can be repeated here concerns Sayer's flight-test report. Stamped SECRETin inch-high letters, the form is divided into the usual component sections, and against "Airscrew Type and No" is entered "Noairscrew fitted with this method of propulsion." The engine. incidentally, is entered as "Whittle Supercharger Type W. 1." Now the famous prototype is a prized exhibit in the NationalAeronautical Collection at the Science Museum in South Kensing- ton. The collection is at present being re-housed in the hangar-liketop floor of a new block Flight last week, page 612) and the E.28 JW- as the picture above shows, was among the bulkier exhibits thaihad to be hoisted up outside the building.
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