EMPIRE AIR MAILS

Press, Volume LXX, Issue 21341, 7 December 1934, Page 6

EMPIRE AIR MAILS

SERVICE TO AUSTRALIA INAUGURATION THIS WEEK (IaiTISH OFFICIAL WIREI.ESS.) RUGBY, December 5. A notable development in Empire air routes will begin on Saturday with the official inauguration of the England-Australia Royal Mail Air Service, the longest air mail route in the world. Mails dispatched by the new route will be delivered in Australia in less than half the time taken by surface transport. Special official letters of greeting will be handed from Lord Londonderry (Secretary of State for Air) to Sir Kingsley Wood (PostmasterGeneral), who will frank them with a special silver stamp ana place them in the last mail bag, which will be immediately sealed. It will be accepted by Sir Eric Geddes on behalf of his company and associated companies, the Indian Transcontinental Airways, and Qantas Empire Airways, which will jointly operate the services. The aircraft will leave Croydon on its long journey at 12.50 p.m. A later message says that the air mail has produced an astonishing response, estimated at three tons of letters, involving an additional machine, starting at approximately the same time as the "official mail carrier."