When the Vulcan spec was first issued in 1946, no one had much idea of what it would be like to fly at 50000 ft.
The problem of teh escape of the crew from a pressure cabin of an aircraft traveling at high speed presents many difficulties declared a Farnborough paper on the “The Vulnerability of a Future Bomber Aircraft” in Feb 1948. A cabin may be which may be jettisonable in a emergency appears to offer the most satisfactory solution.
A jettisonable crew compartment was written into the Vulcan Spec. The captain would press a button whereupon the control linkages would sever and explosive bolts would push the pressure cabin clear. Hinged fins would thenstabilise the tumbling nose before a large parachute came out from behind to lower the cabin withthecrew still strapped into there seats.
Avro spent a lot of time on this and just could not get it to work and they convinced the Ministry to abandon the idea.
They looked at a second canopy about the rear desk, which would not had been a problem for the designers.
Basically the Ministry did not ask for all seats to be jettisonable, so the designers did what the 1946 spec asked them to do.
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