AIR TRANSPORT NEWS
Page 53
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ZONE SYSTEM OF TRAFFIC CONTROL TO BE EXTENDED.
AN important step forward in the control of air traffic over Great 13r1 tam will be made within the next few days by the Air Ministry. "The zone system of controlling radio-equipped aeroplanes is to be introduced, at first in the southern part of the country, where the traffic is very heavy. There is abeady traffic control Of the Continental routes by radio from Croydon, and two new zones are to be controlled from Heston and Portsmouth. Machines will be passed from one zone to the next as they are in the railway signalling system, thus reducing the risk of collision and the confusion of radio messages.
Obviously, the system must extend over the rest of the country, because, to take but one example, the Irish Sea routes will, this summer, be served by half a dozen or more distinct air lines.
NEW SERVICE TO SHETLAND.
LAST week Capt. E. E. Fresson, of Highland Airways, Ltd., Inverness, flew from Orkney to Shetland, and. had a conference with members of the county and town councils regarding the proposed air service to Shetland, which will probably start in the middle of May, with Aberdeen as the southern terminus. The meeting decided to telegraph to the Air Ministry, urging the necessity of immediately providing a mobile radio station for use in foggy weather. Steps will now he taken to make Surriburgh Field suitable for licensing. Capt. Ftesson's flight took 50 minutes.
NIGHT LANDING SIMPLIFIED.
WHEN, after a conference with interVI' national air-line operators, the Air Ministry introduced a systemof traffic control for bad-weather conditions (which was explained in The Coln. niereial Motor, at the time), alternative landing grounds were arranged at Lympne. Penshurst, etc., for aeroplanes, travelling to England on the Paris route, which might not be allowed to enter the Croydon control ZOIle.
The need for corresponding alternative landing grounds on the northeastern route out of London to Amsterdam, Cologne, Berlin, etc., has become increasingly obvious. Gravesend Airport is suitable and is often used, but has hitherto been without the complete lighting equipment Which is necessary for such a function.
The Royal Netherlands Air Line (K.L.M.) has been running, since March 1, a service which reaches Croydon at 8.30 p.m. and for which lights at Gravesend are essential, This company will run an even later service this summer.
The K.L.M. and Airports, Ltd. (proprietor of Gravesend), have therefore
made an arrangement to divide the cost of boundary lights and a flare path for landing. These lights are lit every night, so that, if the machine he stood off by radio from Croydon, it can land at once at Gravesend and passengers can, without delay, be sent to London by coach.
LONDON-EDINBURGH IN 21 HOURS.
ON April 8, North Eastern Airways. Lrd., will start its service between London, Leeds, Newcastle and (subject to permission to use Turnhouse) Edinburgh. The morning machine will leave Heston at 10 a.m. and reach Edinburgh at 12.45 p.m. An afternoon service will leave London at 4.15 p.m. and finish at Newcastle at 6.10 p.m. .A morning machine will depart from Newcastle at 8.30 a.m. and reach Heston at. 10.25 a.m. The afternoon service will leave Edinburgh at 2.25 p.m. and reach Heston at 5.20 p.m. The Edinburgh-London fares will be £5 14s. single and £10 return.
The company's first Airspeed Envoy eight-seater was delivered on March 29.
CRILLY • SERVICE COMMENCES.
AFTER ekperirriental operations betweentween Doncaster and Croydon, Crilly Airways, Ltd., 14, Waterloo
Place, 'London, started, on April 2, a twice-daily service between Bristol, Leicester and Norwich. A journey which .takes about 7i hours by train (or possibly 6 hours by travelling via London) is reduced to 2i hours. The fares between Norwich and Bristol are £4 single and £6 return, and the fares between Leicester and either Norwich or Bristol are £2 single and £3 return. The well-known concern, Rolla.son Aircraft Services, Ltd., Croydon, is maintaining the fleet.
COMMERCIAL PILOTS HELP METEOROLOGISTS.
learn that Commercial Air Hire, Ltd., the company which has, since last summer, run a service before dawn every morning from Croydon to Paris, carrying over half a ton of English newspapers, has recently acquired a Spartan Cruiser aeroplane (three Gipsy III engines), Mr. A. P. Hattersley, one of the three pilots on this service. has just returned from a blind-flying course at Hatfield.
He and his colleagues, Mr. John Pugh and Mr. Eric Noddings (late of Hillman's Airways, Ltd.), are specialists in meteorology and now work in close conjunction with the Meteorological Section of the Air Ministry. They give wireless weather reports each morning when over the Channel and when over France, and recently a strut psychrometer has been fitted to one of their machines for recording humidity values, by way of research into problems of ice formation.
RAIL AND SHIPPING • CO-OPERATION.
PiA SERVICE is to be started by Railway Air Services, Ltd., to connect the Isle of Man at Manchester or Liver
122)1 with the company'S existing main line between London, Belfast and Glasgow. The service will be run on behalf of the London, Midland and Scottish Railway Co. and the Isle of Man Steam Packet Co., Ltd.
There will be co-operation with Blackpool and West Coast Air Services, Ltd. (a branch of 011ey Air Service Ltd., Croydon), in the matter of fares and times. In the Isle of Man, the new service will use Ronaldsway aerodrome, which is controlled by Mr. 011ey. Connections will be made at Croydon for the Continent, and there will be other' connections, this summer, to the south coast and the. west of England.
NEW BLACKPOOL CO. FORMED.
THE new company to operate from Blackpool's Stanley Park aerodrome, as already reported in this paper, is being formed, this week, under the name of United Airways, Ltd. It is jointly owned and controlled by Whitehall Securities Corporation, Ltd., and Mr. W. L. Thurgood, of Jersey Airways, Ltd.
Services will be run between London, Blackpool, the Isle of Man and Carlisle, and other developments are being considered. The company is taking a financial interest in Northern and Scottish Airways, Ltd. This concern operated experimentally last year between Newcastle and the Isle of Man, and is now running Dragons between Renfrew and Campbeltown and Islay.
United Airways, Ltd., will use Spartan Cruisers on the sea crossings, Dragons on the short runs, which are likely to start this month, and D.H.89s on the longer services, which will commence in May. In the Isle of Man, the landing ground at Close Lake, which is being developed by Sir Denvent Hall Caine and his brother, will be used.
SWANSEA AERODROME REPORT.
THE report of Messrs. Norman, Muntz and Dawbarn, the experts employed by Swansea Corporation to make a survey of sites suitable for a municipal aerodrome, has now been received, and is to be dealt with by the council, this month. Meanwhile, there are tentative proposals for Neath and Port Talbot Councils to participate in the scheme.
Obstacles have long stood in the way of Swansea providing an aerodrome, and whether the scheme will now go
through remains to be seen. It is understood that the experts' report reviews all possible sites, but does not anticipate much scope for a seaplane base adjacent to the landing ground.