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Aviation History
1961
1961 - 1827.PDF
FLIGHT, 21 December 1961 941 Safety record of UK airlines (scheduled services), 1946-60 And you probably arrive now in the middle of the night as againstthe pleasant nights in hotels in the old days ? Yes, but in the old days they dragged you out at first light fortake-off. 1 sleep very well in an aircraft—even in those allegedly uncomfortable seats. / have always admired your general outlook on life, and I would havethought you would agree that human progress must be measured in terms of human dignity; I cannot think it is dignified to sit six abreastin a modern aircraft fuselage. The object of the exercise is to get fares down. You must agreethat BE A have so far been very successful; we have pioneered cheaper travel. We don't want to turn aeroplanes into rich men'sluxury clubs; we want to get more people into the air. / was not thinking of catering for sybarites; I was onlv suggestinganother J8in on the beam. However, is there not another aspect ? In your Royal Aeronautical Society lecture you pointed out thatEuropean traffic had increased by 800 per cent in the past 13 years, and that the most important reason for this growth was the reductionof fares. Yet you also showed that six of the nine airlines had unprofit- able European operations because of low load factors. From thisdoes it not look as if the aircraft with so many seats squeezed into them may theoretically show a low seat-mile cost, but that vou arenot filling the seats ? Does that not suggest there is a case for being more generous with available space ? Not at all. I was talking about average load factors. You knowfull well that we have load factors high in some periods and low in others. You cannot have elastic aircraft and you cannot have adifferent type for each route. Actually. BEA average passenger load factors are still good in comparison with the others; they were68 per cent last year, and are now 63 per cent. If you extend your philosophy about the advantages of speed thenlogically you come to the supersonic I do you accept this ? No—or, at least, not for BEA. For BO AC on the Atlanticpossibly, but our average stage is under 300 miles, and no aircraft can go supersonic within that distance. In my lecture I gave 700miles as the stage below which there would be no use for the super- sonic. And in crowded Europe the sonic-boom factor is an impor-tant consideration. No, I don't see BEA going supersonic in the foreseeable future. Do you think, then, that this speed makes sense for the long-hauloperator? Yes, it would shorten the journey time and make it more com-fortable, though from the point of view of economics it would be more expensive. It would probably mean higher fares—or subsidies.As I say, I am keen on getting fares down rather than on aiming at these tremendous speeds. You rather shot me down when I made a similar point earlier ? No, there is some advantage in supersonic speed on longer routes—if you can get it without undue penalties in cost and booms. But there are a lot of ifs and buts about it. If we need to balance one thing with another, as we now both agree— sneed against safety and costs, and so on—would it not be a useful end interesting exercise to have some representative body sit down und consider, with all available experience before them, what would he the best type of air transport vehicle for the future ? Might it not be possible that we should start afresh line of development, rather than restricting effort on to building civil types round available military engines, or progressing from military tankers ? There is something in that. One could visualize an aircraftdesigned primarily for really cheap travel. But it is wrong to leave the impression that there has been no specifically civil development,particularly in this country. The Dart, Tyne and Spey are civil designs and, of course, the corporations and the private companiesclosely study these matters. We have been responsible for a good deal of development; there are examples in the Viscount, Vanguardand Trident. One's whole future depends upon the success of these machines, and the utmost care goes into our specifications. / would have thought that there were two relevant points here. First,you are not specifying these types entirely from scratch; secondly, my hope is that enough operators may stop this business of trying to keepup with the Joneses and agree to some kind of standstill. If they were to agree to a really good production run on a type like the Vanguard—getting full value from the jigs and tools—then we should be in a sound position to provide cheap travel for the masses. Instead, the Vanguardappears to be an aviation mule with no prospects of progeny at all. There is some sense in what you say, but this is a highly competi-tive business. Human nature being what it is, an airline will always come along and attract the traffic with a faster aircraft; and thecorrelation between speed and traffic cannot be overlooked. Look at this graph showing how the traffic between London and Parishas grown in direct proportion to the speed of aircraft used by BEA and Air France respectively. In one period we gain and inanother Air France moves ahead. It's a basic fact that if you fly older aircraft your load factor falls. Within this framework, BEA'snew aircraft like the Vanguard and Trident have been designed from scratch—they are tailor made for our network, in fact, just as theViscount was. We still fly 62 Viscounts, but we can't fly them competitivelyagainst jets. That is why the Vanguard does not seem likely to have progeny. You have achieved some remarkable weekend fare reductions toBelfast and Glasgow. Is there any chance of extending them to other routes ? That is governed to some extent by the mail contract. It is rather a special case, and only made possible by the volume of freight and mail carried. But we shall certainly pursue this policy wherever it seems to be a practicable proposition. When it comes to the possibility of exploiting low fares in a particulararea, or furthering the interests of British civil aviation generally, do you think we might be better served if we had a licensing board withan overall responsibility to plan Britain's effort positively, rather than one which hands out licences as prizes ? Apart from the Board's attitude to recent applications, I thinkthere is something in what you say, though 1 don't see how it would work out. Any airline would object if this outside board buttedin and told them what to do about their operations. Against the background of this need to plan Britain's aviation resources as a whole, instead of piecemeal or in a patchwork fashion, what do you say about the Board's recent decision on the European applica- tions ? I personally think that British air transport would progress inmore orderly fashion, and also more quickly, if we retained the previous regime of two nationally owned corporations each workingon a long-range plan for scheduled operations. Now that we have Tom, Dick and Harry muscling in on the act, it is difficult to seehow an orderly, well-thought-out overall plan for developing scheduled operations can come about. Jan Jan Jan Jan Jan Jan Jan Jan Jan Jan Jan Jan Jan 1 4 5 10II 15 16 17 20 24 26 29 30 Feb 2 FORTHCOMING EVENTS Institute of Transport (Metropolitan Section): "Development of an Airport," by Maurice G. Housego. RAeS: Young People's Lecture, "Airliners of the Future," by Godfrey H. Lee. RAeS Rotorcraft Section: "Rotating Aerofoils and Flaps," by Dr S. Neumark. Guild of Air Pilots and Air Navigators: Livery Dinner. Northampton College of Advanced Technology: "Vickers Air- craft," by H. H. Gardner. RAeS Historical Group: "R.IOI and Other Airships," by Sir Harold Roxbee Cox. RAeS Astronautics and Guided Flight Section: "Development of Seaslug." by C. Bayly and A. Lightbody. BritIRE (Computer Group): "VERDAN—a Miniature Computer for Airborne Use," by B. B. Rayner and S. Morleigh. Aircraft Recognition Society: All-England Competition. RAeS Graduates' and Students' Section: "The New Bluebird," by K. W. Norris. RAeS Man-powered Aircraft Group: "Design Philosophy of Man- powered Aircraft," by J. J. Spillman. RAeS: Joint discussion with Institution of Electrical Engineers. Institute of Transport (West Middlesex Group): "The work of IATA and the Clearing House," by A. J. Quin-Harkin. RAeS Rotorcraft Section: "Rotor Flow Visualization," by Prof J. Valensi.
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