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Aviation History
1963
1963 - 1181.PDF
FLIGHT International, 4 July 1963 7 are very concerned with the problem of sonic boom. Sonic boom is a problem which requires a great deal of work as we move forward in the supersonic transport programme. In the worst case, we would find ourselves with a supersonic transport of such high cruising sonic boom level that we would have to re-route the air plane away from today's airways, so as not to disturb numbers of people in population centres below. This would be highly un economical and our hope is that, as we go forward, this problem can be met through proper design and through the operating profile of the aircraft. Fortunately, we have in this country many hundreds of hours of flight at and beyond Mach 2—far more than any other countries—and it will serve us well in the competition ahead. "The high temperature-levels that will be encountered by a supersonic aircraft on primary body structure presents another very major problem as we look ahead to supersonic development. Today our high flying jet airliners encounter skin temperatures which are moderate and which are well understood metallurgically. If the supersonic transport that is developed in the American programme, out of design competition and design analysis, has a speed of Mach 2-plus, the hottest parts on the body of the airplane will be approxi mately 300°—as much as three times hotter than present jets. If the speed of the airplane gets up to, let us say, Mach 3, the tem perature on the aircraft will be getting up to perhaps 600° on the outside skin. These are very high temperature-levels—levels with which the aviation world has not had to deal to any considerable extent so far as large vehicles are concerned. If the aircraft is to go faster than Mach 2, we would have to use steel and/or titanium rather than the traditional aluminium. Incidentally, we have serious questions about present aluminium alloys after many hours of Mach 2 cruising temperatures. This whole problem of choosing configuration, structure, materials, components, and fabrication techniques to meet very high speeds and temperatures will pose great technical challenges. "But the challenge, and the strongest possible response, is worth it. SST will be the standard bearer of international transportation in the seventies ahd eighties after it has entered service. It will be a valuable, productive machine, a generator of world travel, business and understanding." AIR FREIGHT AND THE ATLB "HIGH cost is a major deterrent to the carriage of goods by air in Europe and the prospects of reducing costs are remote ... There is no general principle which would suggest that there is any advantage in shipping goods by air rather than by surface." These two state ments, made by the Air Transport Licensing Board, are so controversial that they cannot pass without challenge. First, their context. At the request of the Minister of Aviation in June 1962, following a recommendation of the Hall Committee on the Northern Ireland economy, the ATLB undertook an inquiry into air freight services to and from Northern Ireland. The Board has made an interim report to the Minister in six pages of closely typed foolscap, and the foregoing are the first two of seven main conclusions. They are clearly statements of general principle; and as such are startlingly unorthodox. The Board says, rightly, that most freight is carried in the holds of passenger aircraft, as a by-pro duct of these services. The economics of this freight business, they say, are based on passenger fares—either without taking freight revenue into account at all, or by allowing a theoretical percentage of additional revenue from freight on the basis of past experience. In both cases freight revenue is merely a "bonus." The Board's report emphasizes just how much unused freight capacity there is on passenger services. Between London and Belfast, for example, in the year ending October 1962, BE A carried about 2,000 tons of freight—with capacity to spare for no less than a further 13,000 tons or more. It is for these sort of reasons, says the Board, that civil sales of all-freight aircraft like the Argosy and Belfast have been "very small or non-existent." There is "little prospect that costs could be reduced through the introduction of all-freight services." The Board appears to have come to its conclusions without con sidering one of the most potent arguments for the introduction of all-freight aircraft. This is simply that such aircraft, because they enable an airline's freight salesmen to say to the shipper "We can take almost anything," act as back-up and catalyst to the selling of freight on passenger services, and stimulate the airline's whole effort to sell freight—an effort which cannot really be particularly aggressive so long as freight is merely regarded as an incidental bonus to passenger-revenue-costed services. There appears, too, to be a misapprehension in the Board's mind of the nature of freighting by passenger aircraft. "Large passenger aircraft," says the report, "by reason of their aerodynamic shape inescapably contain built-in freight capacity in excess of most likely demands." Inescapably? The Vanguard was designed, specificall- at BEA's request, to have freight holds which would enable cp>; city payload to be carried with only a quarter of the passe%(- seats filled. There was nothing inescapable about the Vanguard » 8-ton freight capacity, which was designed into the aircraft. More over, it can hardly be said that the Comet, or the One-Eleven, or the Trident, have freight capacity inescapably in excess of most likely demands. As the two last-named aircraft bear witness, it is not correct for the Board to say that every year aircraft with "yet larger freight holds" are being introduced. So far as Northern Ireland is concerned there may^ good rea sons why, as the Board suggests, all-freight services should not be considered until existing capacity proves inadequate. But the basis of the conclusion, and some of the principles enunciated by the Board, are open to question. The Board's duty is to further the development of British civil aviation; and to say that the pros pects of reducing air freight costs are remote, and that there is no general principle suggesting that there is any advantage in freight ing by air rather than by surface, seems unnecessarily pessimistic. Nevertheless, there is much in this report to challenge the prophets of all-freighting; and it is certainly welcome for its own sake as an expression of ATLB opinion on an important issue. Copies of the Board's report may be obtained from the Ministry of Aviation, Room 286, Shell Mex House, Strand, London WC2. EXPANSION AT GATWICK EXTENSIONS at Gatwick to begin this year at a cost of £2,500,000 were outlined on June 25 by the Minister of Aviation, Mr Julian Amery. They supplement the £750,000 contract for an additional finger on the north side and extra apron space, on which work is already well advanced. The new work now to start (March 15, 1962, issue, pages 390- 391) involves a third finger on the south side and extensions roughly doubling the size of the terminal buildings. This is due to start this year and to be complete by 1965. It will bring the total cost of Gatwick Airport to £10,250,000. It is also hoped this year to begin an extension ot the 7,000ft main runway of more than 1,000ft, though the exact extra length has not yet been settled. No starting date was announced for the second parallel runway to the north which was envisaged in the original Gatwick plans. There was nothing much new in all this, but Mr Amery took the opportunity to outline to the Press assembled at Gatwick something of his airport philosophy. He urged that Gatwick be thought of not as "a bucket and spade airport," but as an extra east-west run way for Heathrow. This airport, he said, was "apprcviching satura tion point now," with 7m passengers a year. But 1 added that it was hoped this could in the long run be doubled <T4m passengers a year), presumably by improvements in apron handling and the processing of passengers. He insisted that London, like Paris and New York, must now have two major airports. Gatwick traffic should rise from last year's lm to 2£m by 1970 and 5m "well before" 1980. It was his job, he said, to sell the increased use of Gatwick to airlines, though he admitted that some sterner form of persuasion than public relations might be necessary. A third London airport, somewhere to the north-east of Heath row, would eventually be needed—but the Minister would not be drawn further. (It is understood that the Ministry working party now considering this—after looking at Southend, Luton and other airports—is about to report in favour of Stansted. One of the Minister of Transport's new motorways is due to run alongside Stansted, which would improve the present bad communications with London.) Object of the Gatwick runway extensions is to enable all types of big jet to use it, both for scheduled services and diversions. Officials of British United Airways claim, however, that they will be able to take off a VC10 with a full load of passengers for Africa from the 7,000ft runway as it stands. British United officials inci dentally were much in evidence, as the major airline using Gatwick and a good friend of the Ministry on that account. Last year, BUA accounted for 800,000 of Gatwick's million passengers.
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