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Aviation History
1963
1963 - 1018.PDF
FLIGHT International, 20 June 1963 987 (T) Straight and Level © T HE Concorde is basically a French aircraft. The idea came from Pierre Satre, technical director of Sud- Aviation and designer of the highly successful Caravelle. Satre, faced with the difficulty of finding a successor to the Caravelle, to keep France in the civil aircraft business, decided that he must take a leap ahead of the Americans.'"—Tom Margerison in The Sunday Times. Everyone in British aviation is content to go 50-50 with the French on everything to do with the Concorde, including credit for its origin; but there are times—such as when a respected British journalist makes state ments like this—when somebody must speak up in the British interest. I therefore propose to recall the statement made by the then Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Aviation in Parliament in March 1962, as quoted in this column on April 5, 1962, page 509: "Some Hon Members may have seen at the Paris Show a model of the so- called 'Super Caravelle.' I could understand anyone from our establishment at Bedford exclaiming, like Henry V at Agincourt, 'I was not angry since I came to France until this instant,' because the model was extremely similar to, or was a replica of, one designed at Bedford in 1958." • Whilst on this subject I feel bound to say that the French do not seem to be going 50-50 on the question of releasing infor mation. In our June 6 issue we published full basic data for the two Concorde ver- According to "Newsweek" President Kennedy "hit the ceiling" when he read about Pan American's order for Concordes. Here is a photograph of the occasion You were right to turn back, Joe sions; the figures were contained in a brochure which was coming off the press in France at the same time that BAC were assuring us that there would be no disclosure of new information at Paris. • A Sunday newspaper reports that an Air France stewardess, on landing at London Airport, ended her ritual over the cabin address system with the information that "the time in Paris is now just after five o'clock." As the newspaper points out, BST now seems to be the latest target of a French campaign to banish Anglo-Saxon attitudes from Europe. It gave the little report the heading "L'Heure, C'est Moi." • "Earlier marks of Lightnings are now known to have intercepted successfully American U-2 reconnaissance 'planes over Britain at heights of nearly two miles."— The Sunday Telegraph Gad! To think men can live at such heights. • Throughout the United States the term "Blue Streak" is used to denote immediate express delivery. Throughout Britain the same name means the only heavy rocket- launcher outside the USA and USSR; the first stage of the ELDO vehicle, and Britain's entry to the space age. Blue Streak is also the symbol not of Britain's status, but of her resolve to be a technologically progressive nation. I see that the "first Blue Streak to be shipped to Woomera" has completed a lengthy period of testing at Spadeadam, and that it was then put on a lorry. It spent its first night on the road in a car park in Carlisle. Many days later it left a lay-by on the Great North Road near Brookman's Park and proceeded slowly through Potters Bar and Ponders End. It was then put into a large box and taken by boat to Woomera —not for firing but for ground compatibility tests. Please don't think for one moment that I belittle the efforts of the men behind Blue Streak, who are as eager as I to see their product in business. But it is now more than three years since Blue Streak was cancelled as a weapon, and it is time to get a move on. • Extracts from correspondence con cerning the recent Flight International special issue devoted to the Paris Salon:— "Charging car for vehicles obstructing airports." "Little motorbicycle who can be bent and parachuted." "Un bouton de reglage de seuils SQUELCH." "Grumman, Bethpage, Long Island, Grande Bretagne." • In a recent article in these pages Mr Stephen Wheatcroft, economic adviser to BEA, quotes John Kenneth Galbraith in The Affluent Society: "The shortcomings of economics are not original error but un corrected obsolescence." In other words, what Messrs Gill and Bates said (for example) about air transport economics 15 years ago should not neces sarily all be accepted as divine truth today. Obviously there are some air transport laws which have eternal validity. But as for those which have to be corrected for obsolescence, I am just wondering over how many years they should be depreciated to zero residual value? • "Britain is taking a big part in the Parish show this year."—London Evening Standard, Friday, June 7. Toujours l'entente ecclesiasticale! How about trying to get the Balzac across for the parish fete next week ? ROGER BACON
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