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Aviation History
1962
1962 - 2197.PDF
520 FLIGHT International, 27 September 1962 This year TCA are celebrating the 25th anniversary of their first scheduled passenger flight. The Lockheed I0A in the foreground, CF-TCC, was one of TCA's first aircraft and was leased from Matane Air Services of Quebec to reinact the first TCA flight over the original route between Vancouver BC and Seattle, Washington, earlier this month. The aircraft has been on a tojr of Canada AIR COM M ERCE ... BOAC's power unit development manager. Many as yet unanswered questions are now arising relating to the economics of the overhaul and maintenance of large jet engines. Mr Romeril's paper discussed these problems as affected by such aspects as the rapid life-develop ment of engines: the effect of this development on material cost at overhaul; the effects of stage length on material costs at overhaul; the economic effect of the restricted life on certain of the most highly stressed components, particularly in the turbine area; and the economical repair of worn engine components. 1963 IATA Technical Conference The principal theme of the fifteenth annual IATA technical conference to be held at Lucerne from April 29 will be a comprehensive review of the progress towards all-weather approach and landing. Cunard Eagle to BOAC Reservation control and ground handling of the Cunard Eagle Airways "mid-Atlantic" Boeing 707 services are being passed to BOAC from September 29. Similar arrangements for other commercial and sales activities are also being agreed. CAMBRIAN'S BIG LEAP FORWARD AS recorded last week, on April 1 next year BEA are planning to hand over their entire Irish Sea services to Cambrian Airways. The routes concerned are Liverpool-Belfast and all those radiating from the Isle of Man to London, Liverpool, Manchester and Belfast. BEA have always felt that these services would always make a loss, mainly due to the enormous ratio of summer : winter traffic. This unusual move by the corporation, who are implacably opposed to giving one ounce-inch of traffic to an independent airline (though this one has a 33 per cent BEA shareholding) will dispose of a particularly heavy financial millstone. In 1961-62, BEA are estimated to have lost nearly ££m on Irish Sea routes. The corpora tion has already announced its intention of applying for a Govern ment subsidy, of some £Jm again, to cover the heavy-loss Highlands and Islands social services. During discussion on the proposed Irish Sea arrangement, Cambrian gave assurances to the Isle of Man Airports Board that the transferred services would cater for the expanding demand and, served by Viscounts, that they would in no way be inferior to the standards maintained by BEA. Air Transport Licensing Board approval will of course be necessary, and it is ironical that on the proposed change-over day Cunard Eagle Airways' licences become valid to operate a number of domestic and international trunk routes that would have included some of these Irish Sea routes if BEA had not objected 18 months ago at the time of the hearing. It will be interesting to see whether Cunard Eagle are still anxious enough for the routes to object to the new arrangement. Cambrian Airways have a good financial record, and the profit and loss account was favourably balanced by last year's results. However, despite a 33 per cent increase in revenue last year, profit decreased due to rising costs. To counteract this trend, it was announced at the a.g.m. that all fares would be increased by a minimum of 10 per cent next year. These increases are to apply on the new routes. The four ex-BEA Viscount 701s which Cambrian have said they are buying for £750,000 (an extremely high figure, since no BEA 701 has less than ll,000hr and 13,000 landings) will increase Cambrian's business by about 250 per cent. For this operation to be a success, it will be necessary to minimize the cost of the heavy maintenance involved in the high aircraft utilization needed to break even. The four Viscounts will be fully occupied on the Isle of Man services during the summer peak, but additional employment will almost certainly be required at other times. IRAQI AIRWAYS' JET PLANS JANUARY 1964 is the date set by Iraqi Airways for the introduc tion of Boeing 720Bs, following approval for purchase of two of these aircraft by the Iraqi Government. The airline's secretary, Mr Ahmed M. Alaraji, tells Flight International that the 720Bs will operate from Baghdad three times weekly to London via points in Europe, and will serve also Karachi, Delhi, Beirut, Damas cus, Bahrain, Cairo, Algiers, Tunis and Morocco. Plans are in hand for services, right from the start, to Tokyo and Djakarta. Iraqi Airways are also hoping to operate 720Bs across the North Atlantic eventually, though not for a good many years. Explaining Iraqi Airways' unusual decision, announced early in 1961, to invite tenders for the supply of jet equipment, Mr Alaraji says: "We felt we were not sufficiently familiar with the business of ordering jet equipment to know all the considerations involved. So we decided that the invitation of tenders would be the best solution." He was glad to say that the method had proved highly successful. Among the aircraft considered, in addition to the Boeing 720B that finally won, were the de Havilland Comet, Convair 900 and Douglas DC-8. The VC10 was apparently not considered. Mr Alaraji says that financial terms were not a factor in the decision not to choose the Comet, the type which was for some time con sidered to have a good prospect of an Iraqi Airways' order. Iraqi Airways plan to keep two or three of their four Viscounts and though they have not as yet thought about a small jet to replace these aircraft they might well do so in two years' time. Moves towards the creation of an integrated Arab airline, under the auspices of the Arab League, still appeal to Iraqi Airways, though the project has not moved beyond the "initial agreement in principle" among Arab League nations. The League has ap proved the subscription of capital amounting to some £17m for the purchase of six jets, three medium-range and three long-range. The company could emerge in one of two forms: (1) A consortium of Arab airlines, with individual identities preserved, concentrating on long-distance routes; or (2) one integrated all-network instru ment, perhaps with the name United International Arab Airlines. Mr Alaraji considers that pool agreements in the Middle East area will contribute to a solution of the illegal fare-cutting problem. He sincerely hopes that all airlines in all countries will eliminate this malpractice, which, he says, goes on "in every city of the world, every city." Discounts of the order of 25 per cent have, he says, been commonplace in Beirut, and Iraqi Airways have suffered considerably. "We do not undercut, and in any case we would not be allowed by our Government to undercut, by even one per cent," Mr Alaraji says. He agrees that fare increases may complicate IATA's problem of enforcement.
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