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Aviation History
1964
1964 - 0062.PDF
fUGHT International, 9 January 1964 45 AIR CO E R C E BEA's NEW CHIEF EXECUTIVE AT a meeting of the BEA Board on January 3 Mr Henry Marking was appointed deputy chief executive, which means that he will become chief executive when the present holder of this office, Mr Anthony Milward, succeeds Lord Douglas as chairman on April 1. Mr Marking will continue to act as secretary of BEA for the time being. Mr Marking, who is 43, is one of the team of young BEA senior executives who have worked together for the better part of two decades, bringing to the corporation a stability and continuity of management which have obviously been mainly responsible for financial success. He is believed to have been one of three or four candidates from within BEA, which says much for the calibre of the team he will now lead under his old chief Anthony Milward. Mr Marking has been with BEA for nearly 15 years and secretary since October 1950. For the past eight years he has been a member of the management committee and chairman of the forward planning committee. He is responsible for the Corporation's legal work but in recent years he has been involved in wider BEA affairs, in particular as the corporation's leading advocate in licensing hearings going back to ATAC days. Mr Marking read law at University College, London, and was admitted a solicitor in June 1948. During the war he was an officer in the Sherwood Foresters; from 1941-45 he served in North Africa, the Middle East and Italy, and won the MC at Anzio in 1944. While stationed in Jerusalem in 1944-45 he learnt Arabic and studied Middle East history, politics and economics at the Centre of Arab Studies. He is a member of IATA's legal committee, having been chairman in 1959 and 1960. He is active in RAeS affairs and devised and planned the first of the society's annual transport courses at Oxford, the ninth of which takes place in April (see page 52). BIGGEST ATLANTIC FARE CUTS THERE are limits beyond which small airlines like El Al can> because of IATA's unanimity rule on fares, hold up agreement, and for the first time this limit has been reached. The majority of the 19 North Atlantic carriers, despite El Al's insistence on the special US - Israel fare with a European stopover, are recommending for Government approval the biggest series of rate reductions ever introduced on this No. 1 international route. Compliments should be addressed not to Sir William Hildred of IATA, whose members would, but for the intervention last February of the CAB, continue to be operating at 5 per cent higher fares. The man mainly responsible for getting these cuts is Mr Alan Boyd, chairman of the CAB, regulator of the lowest-cost airlines on the route. Anybody wishing to spend a summer fortnight in the States today can only do so for £178, the present economy return fare, unless he can qualify for the "affinity" group fare (which more andI more people were abusing). Now, under the new structure, he will be able to spend up to three weeks (14 days minimum) in the USA, I i New York, for £107 provided he does not depart on a day i the rush periods June 5-28 or August 21-September 13. is astonishingly good value: it means in effect a 40 per cent cut for the benefit of one of IATA's most important classes of client—the low-budget tourist. It will provide real competition for toe group fares (which are retained with certain limitations) andaI so for those fares which have been at the heart of IATA's problems from Chandler to Salzburg to Nassau—non-IATA (and IATA) charter fares. The economy class fare (London-New York) comes down 20 per cent from £178 return to £142 except for the ten busy weeks, which are: eastbound, May 22-August 3; westbound July 17- September 28. During these weeks the cut is £5 only. First-class fares come down by more than 20 per cent. All these reductions will mean very big increases in traffic—which will certainly be needed. NOISE AND SAFETY IN September 1962 the Guild of Air Pilots and Air Navigators rather forcibly expressed doubts Flight International, September 13, 1962, page 468) about the safety of noise abatement operating techniques, and BALPA said that the worst of the procedures were only "marginally safe." The Ministry of Aviation asked the ARB to have a look at the BEA and BOAC operating techniques. Tests were carried out in March 1963 by the ARB's chief pilot, Mr D. P. Davies, on a BOAC Boeing 707 and Comet 4, with comparative checks on a BEA Comet 4B. The test programme is now published as an extremely thorough ARB report.* The ARB's main conclusion is that the BOAC and BEA noise abatement procedures "do not result, in practice, in any material infringement of any minimum safety standards." The procedures are not too demanding or exacting for the pilot, and the report dismisses the risk of fuel starvation when climbing steeply with low fuel load "provided that the approved fuel drills are followed." The level of performance in the second segment, i.e., from the point at which take-off power is cut back, is thought to be adequate, as is the height at which power is cut back. Nor does the ARB think that the steep attitude in the first segment, i.e., the part of the climb between undercarriage up and power cut-back, is hazardous in the event of engine failure or from the viewpoint of instru- ment capability or stall margins. However, some minor criticisms are made of the techniques. For example, 707 first segment climb speeds are considered rather low for use in rougher air and poor outside visual reference; 707 first segment chmb speeds are unnecessarily low and difficult to achieve at light weight, the 707 director horizon pitch inter- pretation is difficult at high angles in the first segment and the use of VR as a reference speed in the first segment of the Comet 4B is a poor choice. Needless to say BOAC, BEA, BALPA, GAPAN, Vickers and de Havilland were brought in on the ARB's inquiry from the outset. An exception to everyone's unanimous agreement comes from BEA, who prefer the use of VR as the Comet 4B's reference speed because they feel it simplifies training, narrows the margins of error and avoids the difficulty of converting existing Comet pilots to a new drill. Their arguments are accepted provided that if VR is not to be used as the reference speed for the Trident, reconsider- ation should be given to the Comet. The ARB is now putting the finishing touches to the airworthiness aspects of anti-noise procedures for inclusion in BCARs in due course. Appropriate limitations will be included in the flight manuals of the VC10, Trident and BAC One-Eleven. *The Safety Aspects of Noise Abatement Techniques, Air Regis- tration Board, Chancery House, Chancery Lane, London, WC2.
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