Having appropriately purchased my copy on Heston Airport (in W H Smiths, Eastbound M4 Service Station, ) I’ve been ploughing through the 23-pager on BOAC. The material about the ‘HorseShoe Route’ needs some clarification. My understanding is that the term applies to the South Africa to Australia multi-stop route(roughly a horseshoe shape and in stages ideal for the Empire flying-boats).
DURBAN – (Johannesburg) – Lourenco Marques – (Inhambane) – Beira – Mozambique –
Lindi – DAR ES SALAAM – Mombasa – Kisumu – Port Bell – JUBA – Malakal – (Kosti) –
KHARTOUM- Wadi Halfa – Luxor – CAIRO – Tiberias – Habbaniya – BASRA – Bahrein –
Dubai – Jiwani – KARACHI- Raj Samand – Gwalior – Allahabad – CALCUTTA* – Akyab –
Rangoon – BANGKOK – Koh Samui – Penang – SINGAPORE – Klabat Bay – Batavia –
Surabaya – Bima – Koepang – DARWIN – Groote Eylandt – Karumba – Townsville –
Gladstone – Brisbane – SYDNEY (*eastern terminus after Japanese conquests in 1942)
1941 twice weekly service from p85 in the Wilson report on Civil Aviation WWII
http://www.gbps.org.uk/information/downloads/files/Report%20on%20the%20Progress%20of%20Civil%20Aviation%201939-1945%20-%20John%20Wilson.pdf
Linking from West Africa to the HorseShoe route was really a separate problem partially solved with landplanes to Khartoum (BOAC, Sabena, Pan American/USAAF-ATC), though a spur BOAC flying-boat route to Lake Victoria was also operated.
The air route down from the UK via Lisbon to West Africa (Bathurst, Gambia) was another separate and serious problem for BOAC and a prime reason for Balfour’s purchase of the 3 Boeing 314s and the original use of BOAC Catalinas. (The larger Short G-class boats ‘Golden Hind’ and ‘Golden Horn’ were also used in 1942)
Golden Horn at Lisbon winter 1943/1943
The non-stop flight from Lisbon to Bathurst was almost as demanding for BOAC’s Empire flying- boats as the trial Atlantic mail-flights….Las Palmas in the Spanish Canary Islands was used to refuel a few ferry flights by the Empire boats in late 1940/early 1941 but Las Palmas was not used after early 1941 (for political/diplomatic reasons?). BOAC had assessed it for both sea and landplane refuelling in 1940.
After the Axis were driven from North Africa (May 1943) and French territories had reverted to the Allies the Horseshoe Route could be accessed again via Egypt so the West African route (and the Egypt to South Africa Horseshoe section) became much less important. (EDIT) After G-AGDA (‘Catalina’) had been wrecked at Poole and G-AGBJ ‘Guba’ was withdrawn ,the remaining BOAC Catalinas were flown out for the Ceylon-Australia (‘Double-Sunrise’)service which is generally considered as a QANTAS operation rather than a BOAC one, though they were allies 🙂
The operation of the Empire boats under Japanese fire in the East Indies was also mainly by QANTAS .
Heston note…although many of the Imperial and BA Ltd landplanes were evacuated to Whitchurch as WWII broke out, Heston was used in the phoney war as a convenient London terminus for Air France (until France fell) and for BOAC landplane flights and KLM/BOAC Lisbon flights (until the bombing in September 1940)
By: scotavia - 4th March 2015 at 15:09
Thanks Longshot for those links, a very informative and enjoyable draft article which balances the romance of flying boat operations with the reality.
By: DaveF68 - 4th March 2015 at 14:25
Indeed Dave although also worth mentioning for those who do not know that the second Guba was just called Guba like its predecessor and not Guba 2 or Guba II as sometimes stated.
Indeed, I should have made that clearer (and hence the ‘II’ being outside the quotes!)
By: longshot - 2nd March 2015 at 20:16
Thanks, David. It’s surprising how patchy the photographic record is of the BOAC flying boats in WWII especially of G-AGBJ and G-AGDA and at Lisbon
BOAC Captain David Brice (also an ‘Aeroplane’ columnist?) wrote a letter to Flight in 1948 which summarises why the big boats had to go
http://www.flightglobal.com/pdfarchive/view/1947/1947%20-%201736.html
and there is an online manuscript by him (unpublished?) about flying the Boeing 314 around 1945
http://www.svsu.edu/library/archives/public/Follett/documents/65_79/KFP075_51.pdf
By: David Legg - 2nd March 2015 at 18:18
The Australian aviator P G Taylor is , I think, credited with the idea of a ‘Reserve Route’ from Western Australia across the Indian Ocean via Cocos Island, , Diego Garcia, Seychelles, to Mombasa (which was the foundation for the Double Sunrise’ route) and he flew it in Guba, but was that the Guba which went to BOAC?
The HorseShoe Route must also have been planned well in advance but when and by whom?
Yes it was Mick. The first Guba went to Russia and was lost during WWII.
By: longshot - 2nd March 2015 at 17:53
The Australian aviator P G Taylor is , I think, credited with the idea of a ‘Reserve Route’ from Western Australia across the Indian Ocean via Cocos Island, , Diego Garcia, Seychelles, to Mombasa (which was the foundation for the Double Sunrise’ route) and he flew it in Guba, but was that the Guba which went to BOAC?
‘Speedbird’, Robin Higham’s 2013 BOAC history, delayed for over 50 years notes that the Imperial/BA Ltd ‘War Book’ set up in February developed the ‘HorseShoe Route’ and the trans-indian Ocean route concepts and they had decided by spring 1939 that on the outbreak of war all airways flying-boats should assemble at Cairo and that Durban would be their overseas base. (As the Air Ministry’s attitude was that they would requisition any civil aircraft as required, one suspects the airways choice of Cairo and Durban was to make that as difficult as possible!)
p4 from http://www.amazon.co.uk/Speedbird-The-Complete-History-BOAC/dp/1780764626
By: David Legg - 2nd March 2015 at 16:25
Worth mentioning that the BOAC/RAF ‘Guba’ was actually ‘Guba’ II?
Indeed Dave although also worth mentioning for those who do not know that the second Guba was just called Guba like its predecessor and not Guba 2 or Guba II as sometimes stated.
By: Bombgone - 2nd March 2015 at 14:49
I still prefer the old BOAC, much smarter than the present day BA Livery.
Amazing to think that the 747 was designed to be used originally as a cargo carrier with the compartment in the hump to be used as crew quarters, now its the first class cabin with tickets costing around £12000 to cross the pond.
By: DaveF68 - 2nd March 2015 at 14:41
Worth mentioning that the BOAC/RAF ‘Guba’ was actually ‘Guba’ II?
By: longshot - 2nd March 2015 at 13:05
BOAC….. VC-10 vs Conway 707 vs P&W JT-3D fan 707
Worth pointing out that all 8 of the ‘707-336s’ *delivered to BOAC before the 747s had cargo doors….this was an important part of the argument BOAC made to the Treasury to get permission to buy American (and they even avoided UK import duty on them because they claimed no equivalent UK product was available). Seems strange now but they took delivery of 3 more brand new 707s in 1971 after their first batch of 747s arrived and 2 of these were passenger only 707-336Bs purchased for the new trans-Siberian London-Moscow-Tokyo route, the last being G-AYLT a cargo 707-336C
* strictly ‘707-336’ means ‘707-320B/C P&W JT-3D fan powered model’… BOAC had 6x 707-336C, 2x 707-336B, 2x 707-379C (Saturn Airways purchased off production line), 1x 707-365C (ex-Eagle 1968 bankruptcy)
There’s some interesting discussion of the maximum range of various BOAC 707s below…surprisingly BOAC did operate their earlier Conway powered 707-436s London-US West Coast (just) in the early 1960s…they eventually received 20 Conway 707s including the 2 from BOAC-Cunard
http://www.pprune.org/aviation-history-nostalgia/377802-boac-b707-436-early-lax-operations.html
707-336C crew training Stansted 1970….no ventral fin on this example
brand-new 747-136 crew training Heathrow (from Prestwick?) June? 1970…taken from the LT public bus route HattonX-Harlington Corner 🙂
By: longshot - 1st March 2015 at 23:20
BOAC (and Pan American) Transatlantic Flying boat Services from 1939
I think it is established that Pan Am started a full passenger/mail/freight transatlantic service with Boeing 314s to Lisbon in June 1939 and to Southampton in July 1939. From August to September 1939 BOAC’s predecessor Imperial Airways performed 8 transatlantic experimental round-trips with Empire flying boats(flight- refuelled by Harrow tankers) and carrying mail/freight but AFAIK not paying passengers . The five non-flight-refuelled round-trips via Newfoundland by BOAC’s ‘Clare’ and ‘Clyde’ in August and September did indeed carry a few non-commercial VIP passengers with the mail/freight including Harold Balfour, ‘Wild’ Bill Donovan and the first American ferry pilots and LIFE magazine captured ‘Clare’ in colour at La Guardia, New York during the Battle of Britain, though the photos remained unpublished for nearly 70 years
http://images.google.com/hosted/life/64c028a70b50b424.html
It seems the transatlantic ‘service’ by BOACs Boeing 314s was somewhat of an accident resulting from their need to have engine maintenance done at Baltimore every 120 hours and (apart from carrying Churchill several times) they flew a circular winter route Baltimore-Bermuda- Azores-Lisbon-Bathurst -Lagos-Bathurst-Belem/Natal-Trinidad-Bermuda-Baltimore with a Summer route available Baltimore-Botwood-Foynes-Botwood-Baltimore and it seems commercial carriage to/from Baltimore was restricted by the U.S. authorities
The Return Ferry Service BOAC operated with Liberators from Prestwick to Montreal and back is credited with being the first sustained landplane transatlantic ‘service’ but operated for government rather than commercial objectives.
The Pan American transatlantic service was initially fully commercial and theoretically available to all nationalities during American neutrality prior to Pearl Harbour though one suspects increasing State Department involvement in who travelled .
John Wilson has recently produced a paper on how the Pan Am Boeing Clippers replaced the Italian LATI South Atlantic mail/courier air service after Pearl Harbour even carrying Axis mail! (and according to Wilson initially uncensored,though censor stations were soon installed en route)
http://www.wasc.org.uk/PanAm%20group.html
It is noticeable from the enclosed maps that Pan Am, too, seemed to follow a circular pattern over the Atlantic, probably like sailing ships with the prevailing winds 🙂
By: Arabella-Cox - 1st March 2015 at 21:56
Should have gone to Specsavers……….!!!!?
By: Archer - 1st March 2015 at 20:44
A very enjoyable feature. The only comment I’d like to add is that the VC10 photo on page 49 shows G-ASGD, not G-ASGO as the caption states.
By: longshot - 1st March 2015 at 15:38
HorseShoe Route
The Durban terminus and maintenance base was run by the pioneering Imperial Airways pilot Captain R. P. Mollard and it was he who flew G-AFCI ‘Golden Hind’ out to South Africa from the UK mid-war. The HorseShoe Route remained in operation till 1947 (see Canopus final group photo?) after which the Empire boats were ferried back to the UK for scrapping
https://flic.kr/p/bUVeQ3 Golden Hind ,Durban? WWII?
https://flic.kr/p/bUVbuE Caledonia, Durban? 1947?
https://flic.kr/p/bVNSXj Canopus, Durban? 1947?
Golden Hind, the last G-class boat, (Transatlantic capable but never so used) survived on the river at Rochester till 1954
By: waco - 28th February 2015 at 20:28
Am really enjoying this edition !
By: David Legg - 28th February 2015 at 16:54
Hadn’t realised it was you Mick!
I gather that Saunders-Roe did not particularly want Guba but one source (Roundel magazine) says that they used it as an “aerial taxi for the transport of spares etc”. I should have been a bit more precise in my comment about the subsequent owner and said Britain’s Air Council as opposed to the British Air Council i.e. ‘British’ was not part of the organisation’s title.
By: longshot - 28th February 2015 at 14:40
Thanks, David….perhaps I should have said ‘withdrawn’….was it actually flown by Saunders-Roe and what was the British Air Council? You sent me a photo of the crashed G-AGDA ‘Catalina’ ‘C1’ which shows the first official BOAC logo with a Speedbird over a Globe worded BRITISH overseas AIRWAYS (crop attached) . This emblem only appeared in a few other photos (of Empire boats ‘Corsair’ after rebuild, and ‘Clifton’ on completion) and on a Lodestar, and on some early BOAC leaflets and adverts….Mick
From an Aeroplane Monthly article by John Stroud on the Empire boats…my guess the paint job put on Corsair after the Short Bros rebuild (1940)
Ad for the UK-Lisbon BOAC service, 1940
A surprisingly late appearance of the first official BOAC aircraft nose logo (1943)
BRITISH OVERSEAS AIRWAYS CORPORATION AND QANTAS, 1940-1945.© IWM (CNA 3627)
Former British Airways managers such as Runciman favoured calling the new airline simply ‘British Airways’ but were over-ruled…. the wrangle over what the airline should be called lingered even until 1946 when a U.S. issued timetable was still titled British Airways.
http://www.timetableimages.com/ttimages/ba2/ba46b/ba46b-1.jpg
The post-war split into BOAC, BEA, and BSAA resolved the name problem but the politicking involved would make an interesting article 🙂
By: David Legg - 28th February 2015 at 14:17
The BOAC Catalinas remaining after ‘Guba’ was scrapped and G-AGDA (named ‘Catalina’) had been wrecked at Poole , were then shipped out for the Double Sunrise service which is generally considered as a QANTAS operation rather than a BOAC one, though they were allies 🙂
Just to clarify Guba wasn’t “scrapped”, at least not at the point that is implied in the quote above. It was offered to Qantas Empire Airways in mid-43 but declined whereupon it was transferred to Saunders-Roe and ended up with them at Beaumaris, Anglesey in early-44, later passing to the British Air Council. It became SM706 in September 1944 and sank in a storm at Pwllhelli later that year, date not known. Although recovered, it was scuttled in 1945.
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February 28, 2015 at 1:53 am