AVIATION “NEW DEAL”

Manawatu Standard, Volume LIX, Issue 23, 24 December 1938, Page 4

AVIATION “NEW DEAL”

BIG BRITISH MERGER. WITH GOVERNMENT (SUBSIDY. LONDON, Dec. 15. The Government’s plan for merging Imperial Airways and British Airways into the new Aviation Corporation, involves a recorcl subsidy of £2,POO,QQO. As a result, the corporation will in 1939 order a fleet of 35-ton flyingboats, to bo introduced op the Empire and Atlantic routes in 1941.

Three experimental 35-top flyingboats are now being built at Rochester for operation at 20,Q0Q feet, and two for operation at 10,000 feet. These will form the basis of a new design, which is being adopted as the standard Empire tj-pe.

The corporation has begun to implement a “New Deal for Aviation” policy. It lias sent a research officer to the West Indies "to investigate the linking up of the colonies and to inquire into the possibilities of a route from the West Indies' to the United States.'

The new British line to Lisbon will shortly begin, as the first step towards a daijy trails-Atlantic service. Six crews will commence training in December, in preparation for the Lisbon-South America route, which is to open in the summer of 1939.

The Aviation Corporation intends to equal the proposed Dutch three-day schedule to Australia if it proves practicable. Three British machines are now being built, which could be adapted for the purpose. Group-Captain Payne states in the Daily Telegraph that the Air Ministry has decided to equip all bmnbers and reconnaissance ’planes with instruments enabling tjierp to make a blind approach during fog or had visibility. If the trials succeed, aU fighters, it is expected, will be similarly -equipped. The Air Ministry, he says, is adopting a system similar to the one used at the Templehof aerodrome. Berlin, and will install it at 4_o British R.A.F. aerodromes, each costing £4OOO. The aircraft apparatus weighs 501 b and costs £2OO for each aeroplane.