anniegray

Concerto

Whaaaat??? I used it a lot back in the day, and you will have known my parents because they were regular customers!

Sealink

I probably booked you, I remember filling in Unaccompanied Minor forms!! Arcade Travel is still going strong!

Concerto

I don't ever remember being a UM on those flights. Probably didn't notice it!

RichP

I flew Dan Air a couple of times, toward the end of things in the 90s. MAD-LGW-MAD to go to school and back home. My last flight with them was the day before they ceased operations, or near as damnit (must have been Oct/Nov 1990). The flight was thoroughly delayed leaving Madrid, and landed into LGW very late at night. There was freezing fog and black ice on the roads so not much in the way of cabs and buses. I'd known when leaving Madrid that the last train would have already gone, but the airline people on the ground assured my parents (I was 14) that I would be met on arrival and sorted out until the next morning. On landing, nothing doing: no one there, no one answering phone calls (before I ran out of credit on my phone card - those were the days), pretty well nothing open in the airport. I had no choice but to wait it out until morning and then take the first train up to school. I remember feeling rather miserable and sorry for myself. But I did spend quite some time exploring the airport trying to find somewhere comfortable to rest up for the night. Never really liked Gatwick since!

'andad

[QUOTE=Ragman;11685504]...............It was a Comet and I remember being told that the windows in the early Comets fell out because they were square (someting to do with pressure build up in the corners).......UNQUOTE

The windows did not fall out. The square corners were a stress concentration that with repeated cabin pressurisation and de-pressurisation resulted in fatigue failure that contributed to the early Comet crashes. I believe the crack initiated in an aerial fixture on the cabin roof that spread to a window corner, causing catastrophic fuselage failure. Subsequent aircraft benefited and fiited more oval windows.

Chris Gilmour

Horrendous airline. I flew on a Dan Air charter from Prestwick to Vancouver, stopping to refuel at Sondrestromfjord in Greenland in July 1974. The co-pilot hadn't arrived that day and the pilot asked if anyone in the 'plane had any flying experience, as without that, they couldn't take off. Luckily an elderly gentleman who had flown Hurricanes in WW2 offered his services and we were on our way. I couldn't make this up! Changed days-this wouldn't be allowed today. Anyway, it was an old Boeing 707 and strangely the flight was rather uneventful. Greenland was interesting, as we decanted into a log cabin type of terminal while the 'plane refuelled.

Silver Fox

How can it be horrendous when it gives you a fantastic story like that !

bisonrav

Anyone happen to have a seat map for a DAN AIR HS748? Specifically DAN AIR, I have some maps of other variants 40-52 seat.

Reason for asking is that I have this photograph taken in G-ARMW in May 1974. From this it ought to be possible to figure out my seat. Window presumably, probably first row looking at the angles, but I'm having a bit of trouble with figuring it out, it doesn't seem quite to work with the windows and engine/prop positioning. Any bright ideas on this welcome.

Silver Fox

Is that photo some sort of ink blot test? If it is, I think I failed!

southsquare

A long time ago, in a far and distant land, I was a Dan Dir "air hostess". It was my early 20s, I had an Oxbridge degree and having left the grad training scheme of a merchant bank (as they were known in the 1980s), I was saving up for grad school. Dan Air advertised for "air hostesses" with languages that I happened to have. The bulk of the work, for junior staff, was charters - ski trips, sports trips, school trips - invariably overnight during downtime on scheduled flights. Cabin service as it is now known wasn't required: we set up the equivalent of the school tuck shop at the back of the bus, invited each row of passengers to come to the back to collect salt and vinegar crisps and a can of Orange Fanta. Sometimes they even got a Penguin biscuit too. But we did get industry discount on most other carriers so shortly before I hung up my white gloves, high heels and returned to school, I treated myself to Pam Am business class to Miami (which was as good as it got, in 1989). And the rest is history.

bisonrav

Maybe I should explain - the object in question is an HS748 prop, with an air intake (I think) just visible at the top right.

I've now been staring at this for a while and I think I now understand the geometry. It looks like the photo is taken at right angles to the prop, more or less, because the bulk of the propeller blur seems to be in the plane of the camera, and the air intake doesn't give any sense of an angle. This would be impossible on an HS748, because the prop is well forward of any of the windows. But looking at the picture I can see the curve of the propeller as a slightly darkened area against the sky top right, so the camera is at a slight angle facing forwards, which is exactly where it would be for a seat by the first set of windows (see the plan below). So I'm comfortable in the assumption I was in the first forward facing row starboard side, window seat. And I just now need to figure out what Dan Air called that - the Comet seating was all numeric for example (there's an example higher up in this thread). Can't find anything in the online timetables,

Quite amazing what you can infer from old photos. With this and some deep meditation techniques, plus the odd subject access request to the US government, I'm gradually reconstructing my entire flight history. .

Grumpyflyer

Apologies for missing this thread earlier. How could anyone of a certain age forget Dan Air? A great crowd. The small refreshment box in the seat back of a Comet beats anything available in BA economy today. As a passenger I recall free drinks, good prices for seats and great crews. Whilst travelling up front on the Comet I remember the water cascade from the roof from condensation on the first departure of the morning, the stop watch to tell us where the Dunsfold NBD was because the aircraft didn’t have an idea for similar reasons and the memorable occasion where we got lost because we left the very young FO to do the driving and chatted whilst we were some 40 degrees off track before ATC kindly reminded us we weren’t going where we should have been. As a lowly young lad I certainly remember when, arriving in some Spanish airport, ops wanted us to position to a Greek airport empty with a wheel and tyre which happened to be where we were to rescue another company flight that had suffered a puncture. Unfortunately, we couldn’t start number three although we tried really hard. Ops found another wheel and tyre elsewhere and we were let off. Nearly immediately after receiving the stand down message the Captain sent the engineering officer out with a large sledge hammer to thump the starter motor off the offending motor and on the third attempt it started. Luckily our pax had boarded already and we came home, only delayed by an hour or so! Great times. The Comets, rumour had it, were purchased from BA and the engineers went through the tech logs and found many, many hours extra due to poor addition from their previous operators. The regulators at the time accepted that but, I recall, wouldn’t allow even more financial advantage by allowing take off and landing on four but turning off a couple for cruise! I also recall buying a beer (or two) for a young lad who opened an inspection hatch on a 748 at Hurn in the 1970’s during what should have been a quick turn around on the round Britain shuttle and a large lump fell out. The Chief was of the belief that he didn’t need to have opened it and the aircraft could have gone on to Gatwick and have been fixed there whereas it was AOG and they had to replace it on the apron in what was probably the coldest and wettest couple of weeks that the airport had experienced. Great crowd and shafted by a certain.......

bisonrav

And persistence works. I have a seat map, actually quite obvious, on danairremembered but hidden away in a gallery without instructions.

Seating Plans - DAN AIR REMEMBERED

1D it was.

bisonrav

Next question: name that airport.

This photo was taken in May 1974 at one of: Cardiff, Bournemouth or Jersey. The buildings at the back, seen under the tail of the HS748 seem to have brick sections with distinctive large windows and white frames, connected with lower story brick and upper storey white (rendered?) intermediate sections with smallish windows, seems to be a large gap for a roadway to go through visible behind the grey truck. Large grey roof sloping down from right to left.

I don't recognize this from Jersey, could I suppose be buildings at the edge of the airport.

The original from which the detail has been taken is also attached.