STRAIGHT&LEVEL
flightglobal.com 10-16 December 2019 | Flight International | 55
Wireless phones
An improved wireless
telephone installation is to
be placed on the
roof of the
seven-storey
building in
Westminster which is now
the headquarters of Aircraft
Transport and Travel. By this
means it will be possible to
receive messages from
pilots while they are actually
in flight between London
and Paris.‘Family’ helicopter
A four-passenger “saloon”
helicopter is to be mass-
produced after
the war, it is
reported. It will
cost about a
quarter as much again as a
car (Austin Seven or Rolls-
Bentley?) and will be “easier
to operate than many cars”.Problem solved
From The Observer for
December 7: “The joint
troubles of
Handley Page
and Beagle
seemed to
present a heaven-sent
opportunity: merge the
two, and possibly Short
Brothers and Britten-
Norman as well.”Saab losses mount
The extent of depressed
civil-airliner markets has
again showed
through in heavy
third-quarter
losses for Saab
Aircraft. The Swedish
manufacturer warns that it
expects to make deliveries
of only 15 aircraft this year,
against a break-even target
of 50.F-BGNX is one of three surviving early-generation Comet examples
Going to great lengths to inform
From yuckspeak to tales of yore, send your offcuts to [email protected]
De Havilland Aircraft MuseumD RayBritish Airways100-YEAR ARCHIVE
Every issue of Flight
from 1909 onwards
can be viewed online at
flightglobal.com/archiveBreaking the
pound barrier
Aston Martin’s latest limited-
edition supercar is a tribute to
another high-speed vehicle,
nothing less than the British
Airways Concorde – and
perhaps includes a nod to its
history in more ways than
planned.
Launching next October, in
partnership with the airline, the
luxury car – called the DBS
Superleggera Concorde – will
have titanium from compressor
blades used across the BA
supersonic fleet, as well as other
Concorde-esque design features
in its livery and interior.
Only 10 are going to be built
(half the number of Concordes),
and while “superleggera” is
Italian for “super-light”, the car
will come with a heavyweight
price tag of £321,350 ($420,000).
Whether intentional or not,
the significance of that figure
will not be lost on anyone
familiar with aircraft
designations from Airbus – the
company which, of course,
evolved from BAC-Aerospatiale,
the manufacturer of Concorde.
Comet‘s home
The world’s only Comet 1a is
finally out of the rain, taking up
residence during November in
the new hangar at
Hertfordshire’s de Havilland
Aircraft Museum.
F-BGNX is one of three
surviving early-generation
Over-signage
“After the usual half mile
obstacle race from kerbside to
aircraft door, this was the final
sign I saw after standing for half
an hour in a jam-packed
boarding gate,” writes D Ray
about this rather pointless piece
of passenger information at
London Heathrow’s Terminal 3.Turkish delight
Troubled Turkish airline
AtlasGlobal had a rather
positive spin on the financial
crisis that prompted it to cancel
all operations last month until
mid-December: “We have
entered a new phase of
restructuring in order to provide
you a unique flight experience,”
the carrier states.
Unique in that passengers do
not get near an aircraft perhaps?versions of the pioneering post-
war jet, and the only one with
the original square windows. A
Comet 1XB is at the RAF
Museum in Cosford, while all
that remains of a Comet C2 –
formerly the gate guardian at
RAF Lyneham – is a cockpit
section at the Boscombe Down
Aviation Collection at Old
Sarum.
The de Havilland collection,
in London Colney, is thought to
be the oldest aviation museum
in the UK, opening to the public
in 1959. Other exhibits include
a Chipmunk, DH125 business
jet, Dragon Rapide, Heron,
Hornet Moth, Sea Venom, Sea
Vixen,Vampire and the front
fuselage of a Trident Two.
Hatfield’s last jet – a BAe 146 –
is there too in fuselage form.One of these machines is a very nippy marvel of
engineering, priced beyond the means of most potential
buyers, and thus with a very limited production run. The
other is an Aston Martin