Monday, February 17, 2020

what an obscure idea for an album cover

3 comments:

  1. Must have been the best way to get to Corsica.

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  2. Naw, they mainly flew the things back and forth across The English Channel. Having just visited Corsica on motorcycle, flying the bikes there would've been great, instead of the hassle of driving all the way from Denmark.

    On 30 April 1946, the second prototype, which was also the first 34-seat Wayfarer, registered G-AGVB, made its first flight. It quickly commenced proving flights in the colours of Channel Islands Airways, where it carried in excess of 10,000 passengers over six months.[1] The third aircraft, registered G-AGVC, was the first Freighter I and had fully operational nose doors. After a number of demonstration flights around the world, the Bristol 170 entered full production. One of the first sales was to the Argentine Air Force, which ordered 15 aircraft.[17]

    The managing director of Silver City Airways was Wing Commander Griffith James Powell, who realised that he could adapt the Bristol Freighter to fly passengers with their cars from Britain to Continental Europe and Jersey. As an "air ferry", it would allow people going on holiday to avoid the lengthy waits and travel times involved in traditional sea ferries. On 14 July 1948, the airline made the first flight with a car, from Lympne Airport in Kent to Le Touquet on the northern coast of France.[18] Silver City Airways would become one of its most prolific operators: during 1954, each Freighter in the company's fleet averaged 2,970 landings and take offs — in excess of eight sectors per day for every day of the year.[1]


    A Silver City Airways Bristol Freighter, viewed from under the wing of an Avro York at Berlin-Tempelhof, 1954.
    In 1953, production of the freighter was moved to Whitney Straight's Western Airways factory at Weston-super-Mare airport. A lengthened version, the Freighter 32, which featured movable wooden partitions in the cargo compartment, was introduced; it could be configured to carry either three 14 ft (3.3m) cars and 20 passengers or two larger vehicles and 12 passengers, the passenger seats being in the rear section of the fuselage.[19] Silver City Airways dubbed this variant the Superfreighter and subsequently built an airport named "Ferryfield" at Lydd in Kent, beginning air ferry services in 1955. In the same year, Channel Air Bridge started operations from Southend, with four Bristol Freighters flying to Calais.

    The last two Freighters of the 214 built were delivered in 1958, one to New Zealand in February and the last aircraft to Dan-Air in March 1958. The New Zealand aircraft was delivered to Straits Air Freight Express (SAFE), which eventually operated one of the largest fleets of Freighters. One of the lengthened aircraft, registered G-AMWA, had 60 seats fitted and was known as a Super Wayfarer.

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