Originally Posted by
jlemon
17. Every Monday at this time, BOAC operated a westbound around the world flight that originated and terminated in London, of course. This service was described as operating via "The Orient" and thus did not stop in Australia. Eleven intermediate stops were made en route on this around the world flight. Name all of them and also identify the equipment flown by BOAC on the service.
18. BOAC was also operating a westbound around the world flight from London which departed every Friday at this time. This flight was also operated via "The Orient" and made eleven intermediate stops en route. However, two of the stops were different from the routing of the flight described in item 17. Identify these two different stops.
Let's pick these off.
By 1962 the Bristol Britannia that used to do this marathon had been replaced by Conway-powered 707s. The first bit of the trip was always straightforward. LHR-New York (still IDL, not JFK yet)-SFO-HNL-TYO-HKG. The Britannia hadn't manage the second Pacific sector nonstop, and refuelled at Wake Island along the way, while the 707 was more capable. The route was primarily operated for Hong Kong passengers, where in those days BOAC was the long-haul operator, to the USA and Australia as well as the UK, and Cathay Pacific was just a regional small-scale operation.
Beyond Hong Kong the routing varied between just about every flight of the week, and also from timetable to timetable, with maybe half a dozen stops along the way. Bombay or Delhi in India, somewhere in the Gulf, Beirut, and Rome or Frankfurt across Europe. Other stops could be any sort along the way.
A contact over here used to work all this out as a junior ops officer at BOAC. All those stops along the Asian routes were scheduled maybe 3 or 5 times a week, or whatever, typical loads from each estimated, included a significant number making just intermediate trips. There were no MEA or Thai long haul flights then, so if you wanted to do Bangkok to Beirut this is how you did it. Additional flights cut in at places along the way as required. Scheduling crews who changed several times along such strung-out routes had to be accounted for, and if the presence of both the 707 and the VC10 (which had separate crews) was a further dimension in later years, well in 1962 it was both 707 and Comet, and back in the 1950s it had likewise been a mix of Canadair Argonauts and Lockheed Constellations, so BOAC were used to such complexities. Like a sort of college exam question, said contact had to present a proposal to senior staff, with justifications for changes from the status quo. A real "best uniform" morning's presentation.
What fun !