NEW PACIFIC AIR SERVICE

Press, Volume LXXXV, Issue 25766, 30 March 1949, Page 4

NEW PACIFIC AIR SERVICE

CANADIAN COMPANY’S PLANS TWO RETURN TRIPS A MONTH (P.A.) AUCKLAND, March 29. The Canadian Pacific Airline’s service from Vancouver to Sydney via Auckland will probably start in July. The company plans to fly two return trips over this route each month with 36-passenger Canadair IV aircraft. A survey flight of this route and of the route between Vancouver and Shanghai and Hong Kong will begin about the second week in April. All of the company’s eight captains wili travel on this flight. The machine will probably be at Whenuapai at the end of April or the beginning of May and will stay for several days while all the captains practise landings and take-offs from the field and familiarise themselves with local conditions. Passengers will not be taken on at Auckland on the southbound service for the flight to Sydney, but will be accepted for the flight across the Pacific to America. No overnight travel will be involved in the service. The aircraft will leave Vancouver on Wednesday morning and fly via San Francisco to Honolulu, where they will stop for Wednesday night and the whole of Thursday. They will leave again for Fiji on Friday morning, stopping at Canton Island on the way to refuel only and arriving at Fiji, because of the crossing of the international date line, on Saturday night. Auckland will be reached on Sunday and, after a stop of two hours, the aircraft will fly on to Sydney the same day. The return flight over the same route will be begun on the following Friday from Sydney, the aircraft staying at Whenuapai for a short time only before going on to Fiji. The Canadair IV is a four-engined pressurised aircraft with a maximum cruising speed of about 300 miles an hour. They will have what are described as “fully reclinable” seats.