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Aviation History
1960
1960 - 0842.PDF
850 FLIGHT, 17 June 1960 AIRCOMMERCE. . . John Cunningham, D.H. Aircraft director and chief test pilot, wel- comes Misrair officials and the UAR charge d'affaires to Hatfield on June 10. The map shows Misrair's initial Comst 4C route network KHARTOUMO "Flight" photograph MISRAIR GETS ITS FIRST COMET '"THE possibility that Misrair may order three more Comet 4CsA was mentioned at Hatfield last week by Ibrahim H. Gazarine, UK regional manager of the airline. The occasion was thedelivery, "right on time," of the first of United Arab Airlines' three Comet 4Cs. The next is due to be delivered, Misrair toldus, before June 30, and the third before December 31. The first aircraft, SU-ALC, left for Cairo the day following the ceremony,June 10, and it will be put into service on July 16 after the usual route proving and crew training. The Comet 4C is the first jet airliner to be operated by a MiddleEast airline, and it is by far the biggest aircraft ever adopted by Misrair. It is to operate five round trips weekly between Cairoand London via Rome calling at Geneva (once), Zurich (twice), and Frankfurt (twice). It might have been expected that, by introducing an aircraftwith more than double the capacity of the Viscount, frequencies would have been reduced: however, Misrair's Comets are notonly replacing Viscounts service-for-service on the routes to Western Europe; the airline is also maintaining three Viscountround trips per week. Asked whether the airline was confident that this virtual trebledcapacity would be filled, the deputy general manager, N. F. Raafat, said that Misrair was indeed confident. Viscount load factors onthe routes concerned had, he said, been about 90 per cent throughout 1959. Mr Gazarine told us that Misrair plans to implement, possiblynext year, its US traffic rights by operating a transatlantic service to New York, probably via London, and other plans call for a GERRY FREEMAN RESIGNS ONE of the stalwarts of the independent airline scene, G. H.(Gerry) Freeman, has resigned. He has given up his position as chairman of Transair, a company that he founded in 1947 andwhich he built up into one of the most efficient and respected (and highest-morale) operators in the business. When he sold out to Airwork in 1956 he retained much of hisindependence, but the British United Airways consortium has now swallowed Transair's separate identity and he has decided that thetime has come for him to withdraw. It would be a sad loss to British air transport were he to make no further contribution tothe industry. SOUTH AFRICANS BOYCOTT FACTS /CRITICS of South African Airways are fond of suggesting,^ rather unfairly, that the Union's national airline is run by railwaymen. Those who have sampled SAA's excellent servicemight well reply that if this is the case, there should perhaps be more railwaymen in the airline business. But in one respect SAA's management is open to criticism.The standard of their annual report is low. The first point that strikes a regular reader of airline reports is that this one is con-siderably out of date. For instance, it is probably safe to say that few people are interested in mid-1960 to learn that "on August 27,1958, all activities were transferred ... to the new airport at Bloemfontein." The next thing that strikes the reader is the drabappearance of this report; indeed, the departure scene reproduced on the front cover could hardly look less inviting. But these are perhaps superficial criticisms. Of much greatersignificance is the fact that the authors appear to have deliberately said as little as possible about their airline's activities. Forexample, the report lacks even a rudimentary set of financial accounts, the discussion of money matters being limited to thebald statement that revenues fell from £8.7 million to £8.6 million while costs rose from £8.0 million to £8.8 million. When so littledetail is given, expressions such as surplus or deficit are of little value. Turning to the statistical side, again the report is quite Comet service to India. Comet services to Kuwait, Jeddah andKhartoum will be introduced from July 16. On the subject of Misrair's possible integration with the ArabLeague's proposed Pan Arab Airways, Mr Gazarine was non- committal, though he said that plans for such a common aero-nautical policy were still alive. He discounted the suggestion that Misrair and MEA, both being Comet operators, mightrationalize maintenance and spares, though he said that the existing pool agreement between the two operators on the Beirut -Cairo route had worked extremely well for the past five years. The handing-over ceremony last week was performed by thedeputy managing director of de Havilland Aircraft, R. E. Bishop. Relations between Misrair and de Havilland go right back to thebeginnings of the airline in May 1932, the Egyptian airline's first aircraft being a D.H.60 Gipsy Moth. Subsequently Misrairoperated five D.H.89s, two D.H.86s and two D.H.84s. Mr Gazarine spoke highly of the Rolls-Royce and Vickers sup-port for the Viscounts that they have operated since 1955, and he said that Misrair felt the same degree of confidence in deHavilland. Despite the most attractive offers from American jet airliner manufacturers who had, he said, "almost offered to givetheir aeroplanes to us," Misrair had always wanted the Comet. The deputy technical director, Hussain Tewfik, said: "Weknow British aircraft and we want to go on buying them." The Russians had offered Tu-104s at "very extended hire purchaseterms," though with the "unacceptable" condition that engine overhauls had to be carried out in Russia. Misrair was, he said,interested in the VC10 as a possible successor to the Comet 4C. inadequate. There are no figures for passenger-miles, seat-miles,load ton-miles, capacity ton-miles or load factors. For the record, the only traffic statistics given are passengers carried (down from309,000 in 1957/58 to 297,000 in 1958/59), freight ton-miles (down 23 per cent from 4.1 million to 3.1 million) and mail ton-miles (up 15 per cent from 3.1 million to 3.5 million). Perhaps the most surprising shortcoming of the report is thefailure of the text to describe what has been happening on the commercial side. To take an example, the remarkable fall infreight business can be established as being almost entirely due to the fall of traffic on the Springbok service to Europe. Thisdecrease is not too informatively attributed "to a reduction in the volume of freight offered for conveyance by air." The equallyremarkable 20 per cent increase in mail on the Springbok service is passed over without comment, and there is no word in eitherthe English or Afrikaans version about future prospects. CAN A MUNICIPAL AIRPORT PAY? (continued from page 849) European Aviation are another operator to move in. Orion areto do so in September but there is still room for others and Coventry's airport committee guarantees them a welcome. A manual homer is the sole aid available at present, but aCRDF will be available shortly. Later this will be backed up by either a Decca 424 airfield radar (in any case radar is availablethroughout the Birmingham control zone) or by the type of approach aid opted for by the airlines themselves, say ILS. Of the other projected stages of the plan, stage two provides fora secondary runway, apron, access road and for a terminal block and new control tower. These could be provided for anestimated £148,000, bringing the total to rather over £350,000. Stage three provides for relatively minor improvements and stagefour for a major extension of the runway up to 9,000ft or more with additional taxiways, lighting and road diversions. Each stagemust show a profit—or profit potential—before the following stage is embarked upon. So by the time that the fourth stage isreached flying from Coventry should be big business indeed.
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