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Aviation History
1963
1963 - 1332.PDF
156 FLIGHT International, 1 August 1%$ AIR COMMERCE . . CONCORDERS ACCORDING to Aviation Daily Mr Robert Six, president of Continental Air Lines, has notified the US Government that he plans to buy Concordes. He is reported to have informed Mr Lyndon Johnson, US Vice-President, and head of President Kennedy's SST advisory group, of this intention. The Concorde will probably not fulfil the requirements of Lufthansa, according to Herr Gerhard Hoeltje, technical director of the airline. As plans are at the moment, he says, the aircraft will be able to lift a pay load of nine tons London-New York and with some concessions just manage Paris-New York. Lufthansa, he says, needs an aircraft which can fly from any point in West Germany to the United States. The Mach 3 airliner, he said, is "obviously the 'plane of the future." Aviation Week reports that the British and French Governments have agreed that no further "option-orders" of the sort placed by Pan American will be accepted. This is because the two Govern ments "apparently now feel that such action merely ties up Sud- BAC production planning without guaranteeing that the reserved production line slots will be used." Continental are one of the most efficient and commercially aggressive of America's domestic airlines (Flight International, June 6, page 807) and Pan American is the USA's most efficient and competitive international airline. The first serious export interest in the Concorde has thus come not from prestige carriers, but from two of the world's most commercially minded airlines. lATA'S EXAGGERATED DEATH "70 those who have elevated I AT A to some reverent and unreachable pedestal, I would remind you that it is nothing more than an over- glamorous trade association whose essential objective is international price-fixing. It Junctions because the US Government permits it to Junction by granting it a unique privilege—exemption Jrom United States anti-trust laws. This privilege is granted at pleasure and will be withdrawn ij the public interest so requires.'"—Senator Magnuson, chairman of the US Senate Committee on Interstate and Foreign Commerce. WITH these recent words of Senator Magnuson fresh in the memory, the aeronautical authorities of twenty-two countries met in Ottawa from July 15-18 for what was described in the com munique as "an informal study of procedural improvements in the relationship between governments and IATA." The meeting was attended by Sir William Hildred, director-general of IATA, by his colleagues Messrs H. D. Reynolds and E. S. Pefanis, and by a number of airline observers. The meeting was called as a more relaxed follow-up to the rather heated meeting in London last April (issue of May 9, page 667). Canada was host country, and the unusually informative final communique bears the strong imprint of the two countries— Canada and the USA—whose aeronautical authorities are charged by law to consider first and foremost the public interest. For example, it is thought that the meeting will "encourage the responsiveness of IATA to public interest considerations." No startling recommendations are made. Nothing came, for example, of suggestions from the anti-IATA extremists in the USA that IATA's unanimous voting rule should be changed in favour of weighted voting, or that government observers should partici pate in traffic conference meetings. The recommendations are, in fact, quite mild. It is suggested that IATA should "further explore" the idea of excluding from voting those airlines who are not in terested in the fare at issue. (Exactly four years ago, it will be re called, a parliamentary select committee in the United Kingdom described as "lunatic" the fact that a freight carrier, Seaboard, was able to obstruct a North Atlantic passenger fare agreement.) But who is to decide whether or not an airline—to use the words of the communique—has a "significant economic interest" in a particular route or fares resolution? Governments also ask IATA to allow them more time to con sider fares resolutions. This means, in practice, that new fares proposed for April 1 effectiveness should be in the hands of govern ments by Christmas at the latest. IATA are also asked to make available to governments "mean ingful information concerning the advance agenda committee reports, summaries of daily proceedings, resolutions passed, and the relationship of differences between existing and proposed resolutions." This passage is almost certain to have been sponsored by the CAB, who for years have been asking IATA for minutes etc, of their fares meetings. What is not too clear here is why the governments could not ask their own airlines for copies of this sort of information. Details of the secret fines imposed by the IATA breaches com mission are also requested by governments. And—again obviously inspired by the public-interest-conscious CAB—is a requirement to "make available a subscription service which would provide for the dissemination of IATA agreements to the interested public, at a reasonable price." The chief British delegate at the meeting was Mr Michael Custance, deputy secretary at the Ministry of Aviation. Leading the US team was Mr Alan Boyd, chairman of the CAB. BOAC WHITE PAP.ER MR JULIAN AMERY, the Minister of Aviation, received Mr John Corbett's report on BOAC early in June. Since then he and his advisers have been considering how much of the report Parliament and the public (who for four months were not told that it had been commissioned) should be allowed to see. The report was commissioned, on the understanding that it would be confidential, in July 1962, a year ago. Parliament was told about it in November 1962. Since then the Minister has several times, in answer to questions, said that it would not be pub lished. Now, in the House of Commons on July 22, the Minister told MPs that a White Paper would serve as a basis for debate. Because the House this week goes into recess until October, the Ministry should have ample time to produce a constructive statement of policy. Parliament will have no means of knowing how many of the report's findings have been incorporated in the White Paper—unless, as is possible, the report is leaked to the Press. There is good reason to believe that nobody in BOAC has seen the report, though it is almost certain that BOAC are of the view that the report contains much that will be unpalatable to the Minister. Sir Basil Smallpeice is on record as having said "we have nothing to hide." The White Paper will be the Minister's oppor tunity to show that he too will be as frank with the country as BOAC has evidently been with Mr Corbett. Most important is that the White Paper should not be solely a post mortem; after all, it need have taken 12 minutes, not 12 months, to apportion blame for BOAC's £64 million deficit (aircraft delivery and technical troubles, £34 million; management [associates, equipment policy, traffic forecasting], £20 million; bad luck, £5 million; unions, £5 million). If it is to be of value, the White Paper ought to be a forward-looking, progressive statement on the BOAC of tomorrow. Ghana's First VC10 will be delivered in August 1963, according to Ghana Airways News. The airline has three standard VClOs on order. Nine Ghanaian pilots are soon to be sent to the United Kingdom for conversion to the VC10, according to the news paper. Tu-104 Accident It is now known that about 30 people lost their lives when an Aerofiot Tu-104 crashed at Irkutsk, southern Siberia, on July 13. The aircraft was en route from Peking to Albania. Among the victims was the wife of the Albanian ambassador V> Communist China. Sabena's Loss According to a Sabena statement, the airline earned BFr3,765m in 1962 (£27m) and "require a further BFr470m (£3.36m) to make up the amount needed for depreciation." This means that Sabena made a loss of £3.36m in 1962. This will be covered by a "repayable advance" from the Belgian Government. Air Inter Orders Nord 262s The French Minister of Public Works and Transport has confirmed the Air Inter order for four Nora 262s. These aircraft will be delivered in the spring of 1964. Present Nord 262 production rate is two aircraft per month.
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