Hope and glory

On May 2 1952 G-ALPY, a de Havilland Comet 1, left Heathrow for Johannesburg via Rome, Beirut, Khartoum, Entebbe and Livingston.

Total elapsed time was 23 hours, 23 minutes, the Comet arriving 3 minutes early.

So why am I telling you this story? One of my passions is collecting old aircraft magazines from the 1940s and 1950s when aviation, as we know it today, was shaped.

A recent purchase of a batch of The Aeroplane magazines uncovered a gem – the commemorative issue of the first service of the Comet. The issue had 109 pages with 120 advertisements from suppliers to Comet or BOAC – many of them full page and in colour.

The magazine also included four pages in colour of the earlier route proving flights to illustrate the momentous journey.

The pictures paint a quaint picture of travel in 1952.

There are no fences at the airports, no security, just pilots, passengers or onlookers taking a respite from the sun under some lovely trees.

Access to the runway was a non-event for locals who wanted to take a closer look at the future of aviation.

And the future looked very bright for the Comet with sales flowing in.

In addition to BOAC, UTA and Air France and Canadian Pacific Airlines had ordered Comet 1s, while Comet 2s has been ordered by Air India, British Commonwealth Pacific Airlines, Japan Air Lines, Linea Aeropostal Venezolana, and Panair do Brasil.

US airlines Capital Airlines, National Airlines and Pan Am placed orders for the Comet 3 while American Airlines had expressed serious interest.

Qantas was also looking carefully.

And these orders and prospects were not lost on the editors of The Aeroplane who wrote: “Without doubt the real significance of today’s date is that it will be the birthday of British supremacy on the air routes of the world. We will record our conviction today that the coming of the Comet has changed travel habits of the globe as much as the coming of the [Stephenson’s] Rocket sounded the death knell of the long distance drawn coach. ” The editors went on to rubbish the naysayers. “We of The Aeroplane make no secret of our pride and belief in the new race of turbine-engine transport. We have no patience with the dismal johnnies who advise caution on grounds of airline economics and fear of the unknown. From the first we have been privileged to visit behind the scenes at Hatfield [where the Comet was built]. Fifty per cent of our staff have flown already in the stratospheric Comet and from the first we have witnessed with enthusiasm the way Hatfield tackled the job. ” Sadly, while the editors were spot on with their praise of a turbine future the Comet was not to play the role that had been hoped.

As is well documented structural flaws were to ground the plane after a series of tragic crashes in 1954.

The resultant Comet 4 cured those problems but only secured limited sales and its last commercial service with Dan Air was in 1981.

Instead it would be Boeing, a relative bit player in the commercial aviation world but a giant in the defence sector – think B-17, B-29 and B-47 – that would take that expertise to win the ‘new race of turbine-engine transport’, and make the jet airliner a practical reality.

But it was a success built on the shoulders of the learnings from the Comet.