The Aviation Historian — January 2018

12 THE AVIATION HISTORIAN Issue No 22

international tour would impress potential

customers around the world, particularly those

in the Commonwealth.

There were still many sceptics who believed

that not only had the Comet’s reputation been

fatally damaged by the catastrophic crashes of

the Mk Is in 1954, but also that the American

aircraft manufacturers had caught up so quickly

that any commercial advantage had been lost.

SOMETHING TO PROVE

The manufacturer set out to prove that the

Comet 4 was commercially viable — and safe

— with the only aircraft available to it; the sole

Comet 3, G-ANLO, as close to a Comet 4 as

was possible at the time, given that it had been

built while the crash investigators were still

working on their final report. The fuselage had

not been modified. To have done so would have,

according to the de Havilland Gazette in early

1956, “needlessly delayed the aeroplane’s test

programme”. This meant that it could only be

partly pressurised which, in turn, meant that

it could fly no higher than 20,000ft (6,100m).

Furthermore, the aircraft was not allowed to

carry a full complement of passengers on any of

the long-haul sectors and the crew was provided

with a specially-fitted oxygen system.

In a later interview, Peter Buggé, Cunning-

ham’s Norwegian copilot and longstanding

colleague, revealed that he was less than

enthused by the Comet 3: “We did a lot of flying

[it] in preparation for the Mk 4, but it had the

same skin as previous marks, the ones that had

blown up, so we could only have half-pressure,

which meant it was very uncomfortable, and

they made us wear parachutes at one point; we

had to refuse. We had no suitable seat for them

and there was no way we could get out of the

Comet. They were a great encumbrance laid

down by somebody who didn’t know what they

were doing”.

There was no doubt, however, that the planned

tour was of great importance when a large

Surrounded by de Havilland employees, dignitaries and members of the press, G-ANLO is just about visible on

the distinctive honeycomb-pattern hardstanding at Hatfield before its several attempts to depart the very foggy

airfield on its world tour on December 2, 1955, for which the Comet was painted in BOAC’s elegant colour scheme.

The Comet 3 incorporated a 15ft 5in (4·7m) fuselage stretch and

was powered by four Rolls-Royce Avon 502 turbojets in place of the

Comet I’s de Havilland Ghosts. The new variant was also fitted with

wing-mounted pinion fuel tanks at two-thirds span, and made its first

flight, at Hatfield in the hands of John Cunningham, on July 19, 1954.

BAE SYSTEMS CP

BAE SYSTEMS DH9176H