Dan-Air
| Dan-Air | |
|---|---|
|
|
| IATA code : | THERE |
| ICAO code : | DAN |
| Call sign : | DAN-AIR |
| Founding: | 1953 |
| Operation stopped: | 1992 |
| Seat: |
London , UK
|
| Fleet size: | 36 |
| Aims: | international |
| Dan-Air ceased operations in 1992. The information in italics refer to the last status before the end of operation. | |
Dan-Air was a British airline based in London from 1953 to 1992 .
history
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The airline was registered on May 21, 1953 under the name "Dan-Air Services Limited" as a subsidiary of the shipping broker "Davies and Newman" in London. As the creditor of the bankrupt company "Meredith Air Transport", the brokerage office took over its entire property in Southend , which also included the only aircraft in operation, a Douglas DC-3 ( aircraft registration G-AMSU). Here, the name component introduced Dan summarized the initials of the owner D Avies a nd N represents Newman ".
The commercial flight service began in June 1953 with the route Southend to Shannon via Manchester (then "Ringway Airport"). In the summer and autumn of 1953, the DC-3 was chartered for profit in England and Europe, including taking over transports as part of the second "Mini Berlin Airlift". In the same year, the scheduled service began with flights to the Channel Islands, whereby 4000 passengers could be carried by the end of the year.
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In January 1954, Dan-Air took over the second DC-3 (G-AMSS) from the bankruptcy estate of William Dempster Limited, based at Stansted Airport (Essex). In 1955, Dan-Air moved from Southend to the former Blackbushe military airfield in west London. Several other companies had already settled here (including Silver City Airways , Airwork Limited , Britavia ), so that the space available for an expandable maintenance base was very limited. In addition, individual taxiways and even a runway crossed the A30 , which led to its frequent closure to car traffic. This led Dan-Air to set up a maintenance base at the nearby Lasham military airfield , between Alton and Basingstoke . This operated as a subsidiary "Dan-Air Engineering Limited".
In early 1955, the two DC-3s were supplemented by three Avro Yorks bought by the Royal Air Force . The first long-haul operations were carried out with the Yorks with flights to Africa. In connection with the Hungarian uprising in December 1956, rescue flights were carried out, bringing about 350 refugees to England. After the Ministry of Civil Aviation had completed the two-year expansion of the small airfield in Gatwick to an airport in 1958, the base in Blackbushe was closed and Dan Air operations were relocated to Gatwick in Surrey . At this time Dan-Air began operating charter flights for package travelers, a line of business that remained one of the company's core activities until the end.
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The first pressurized cabin aircraft were purchased in 1960. The three ex- BEA Airspeed Ambassadors came from Butler Air Transport in Australia and served routes to the Netherlands, France, Germany and Belgium. In 1961 Dan-Air took over the facilities and aircraft of the Scottish Airlines based in Prestwick . This had to cease operations after five of their Avro Yorks were lost and as a result the contract for the transport of troops across the North Atlantic and to the Middle and Far East was terminated by the Air Ministry . In addition to a third DC-3, Dan-Air also received the rights for the flight route between Prestwick and the Isle of Man .
From May 1966 two former BOAC - De Havilland DH.106 Comets were extensively converted in Lasham to make them suitable for the planned short-haul operation at Dan-Air. Dan-Air was the second British company to have jets in its fleet. With the start of a Comet on March 31, 1968 from Berlin-Tegel to Málaga , the long-term collaboration with Neckermann and Reisen began , combined with the establishment of a base in Berlin. In October 1969 the first transatlantic flight with vacationers to Trinidad was carried out. In total, Dan-Air had almost 50 Comets in its fleet, which made the company the world's largest operator of this type. The Boeing 707 was launched in March 1971, and in the same year it was converted into a public limited company and the ship and flight operations were separated into two independent companies.
At the beginning of 1970 Dan-Air founded the subsidiary "Gatwick Handling Ltd." to operate the airport, which in February 1972 decided to work closely with Laker Airways and the British Airport Authority. From 2000 the company was called "Aviance".
The different types of aircraft operated by Dan-Air made it possible to react flexibly to the requirements of the charter business. From 1969 the 89-seat BAC 1-11 was used as one of the most frequently used models for this purpose, and from September the Boeing 727 with a seating capacity between Boeing 707 and BAC 1-11 also flew . By the end of Dan-Air, a total of 22 Boeing 727s had been procured.
An important factor that led to the decline of Dan-Air was the use of the large travel companies' own airlines to transport their package customers. In contrast, the purchase of capacities from independent providers has been reduced significantly. The expansion of the scheduled flight network and the sale of "Dan-Air Engineering" (1991 for £ 27.5 million) did not bring the desired success, so that merger opportunities were looked for. The plan to form a company "Virgin European Airways" together with Virgin Atlantic failed. Eventually an agreement was reached with British Airways (BA). On October 23, 1992 BA bought Dan-Air for the symbolic price of one pound, including the not inconsiderable debt. This went hand in hand with the layoff of 1,500 of the total of 2,000 employees at Dan-Air and the shutdown of all aircraft, with the exception of twelve Boeing 737s , which were still operated by BA.
fleet
Dan-Air owned the following types of aircraft:
- Airbus A300
- Airspeed AS.57 Ambassador
- Avro York
- BAC 1-11
- BAe 146
- Boeing 707
- Boeing 727 -100, -200
- Boeing 737 -200, -300, -400
- Bristol 170 Freighter
- Cessna 150
- Cessna 310
- De Havilland DH.104 Dove
- De Havilland DH.114 Heron
- De Havilland DH.106 Comet 4
- Douglas DC-3 / C-47
- Douglas DC-4
- Douglas DC-7
- Handley Page Marathon
- Hawker Siddeley HS 748
- North 262
- Piper PA-23 Apache
- Vickers Viscount
Incidents
Between 1958 and the cessation of operations in 1992, Dan-Air had ten accidents with total loss of the aircraft. In six of them, 288 people were killed.
- On May 20, 1958, a Dan-Air Avro York C.1 ( aircraft registration G-AMUT ) touched down late on landing at Malta Airport and rolled over the end of the runway. The landing gear was retracted to bring the aircraft to a standstill. The machine collided with a wall and was irreparably damaged. All three crew members on the cargo flight survived.
- On May 25, 1958, the crew of an Avro York (G-AMUV) carried out an emergency landing on the flight from Karachi to Delhi due to a burning engine near Gurgaon (India). The cargo plane broke on the uneven terrain, and four of the five crew members were killed.
- On April 14, 1966, an Airspeed Ambassador (G-ALZX) touched down very late on landing in Beauvais-Tillé , rolled over the end of the runway and collided with a pile of earth. The machine was damaged beyond repair. All 59 inmates survived.
- On September 30, 1968, on a training flight with the Airspeed Ambassador G-AMAG of Dan-Air, the right main landing gear could not be locked. The pilots evaded to Manston Airport and belly landed there on a foam carpet . The machine was then beyond repair, but both crew members survived.
- On July 3, 1970, a De Havilland Comet 4 (G-APDN) coming from Manchester flew into a mountain while approaching Barcelona Airport northeast of the field in the Sierra del Montseny southwest of Arbúcies . All 112 people on board were killed. The causes were navigation errors by the pilots and incorrect instructions from air traffic control .
- On May 14, 1977, a Boeing 707-321C (G-BEBP) used as a cargo plane for IAS Cargo Airlines crashed vertically on approach 3.6 km west of Lusaka Airport (Zambia). The reason was the fatigue fracture of the entire right half of the elevator . All six inmates were killed.
- On July 31, 1979, the Hawker-Siddeley HS 748 G-BEKF did not take off when attempting to take off from Sumburgh Airport ( Shetland Islands ) because the elevator was locked. The machine fell into the sea 50 m behind the coast, killing 17 of the 47 people on board.
- On April 25, 1980, when a Boeing 727-46 (G-BDAN) crashed, the company was hit by the most serious aircraft accident to date for an aircraft registered in Great Britain. The aircraft coming from Manchester was flown into a mountain while approaching Tenerife / Los Rodeos airport (CFIT, Controlled flight into terrain ). The causes identified were navigation errors on the part of the pilots and unclear information on the part of air traffic control . All 146 inmates were killed.
- On June 26, 1981, while cruising on the Hawker-Siddeley HS 748 G-ASPL, the right rear door came loose, got stuck on the horizontal stabilizer , making the aircraft uncontrollable and crashing. All three crew members on the cargo flight from London Gatwick to East Midlands Airport were killed (see also Dan Air Flight 240 ) .
See also
literature
- Graham M. Simons: The Spirit of Dan-Air. Peterborough 1993, ISBN 1-870384-20-2 .
- Russell Ison: Dan-Air - Popular British Charter operator , in Airliner Classics, November 2011, pp. 86–98
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ Photo of the company's first aircraft on airliners.net , accessed October 5, 2012 (English)
- ^ Ulrich Klee and Frank Bucher et al .: jp airline-fleets international . Zurich Airport 1966 to 2007
- ↑ Simons pp. 225-240.
- ↑ Accident statistics for Dan-Air , Aviation Safety Network (English), accessed on February 6, 2019
- ^ Accident report Avro York G-AMUT , Aviation Safety Network (English), accessed on February 5, 2020.
- ^ Accident report Avro York G-AMUV , Aviation Safety Network (English) , accessed on January 21, 2016.
- ^ Accident report Ambassador G-ALZX , Aviation Safety Network (English) , accessed on January 28, 2016.
- ^ Accident report Ambassador G-AMAG , Aviation Safety Network (English) , accessed on January 27, 2016.
- ^ Accident report Comet 4 G-APDN , Aviation Safety Network (English) , accessed on January 21, 2016.
- ^ Accident report B-707 G-BEBP , Aviation Safety Network (English) , accessed on January 21, 2016.
- ^ Accident report HS 748 G-BEKF , Aviation Safety Network (English) , accessed on January 21, 2016.
- ^ Accident report B-727-100 G-BDAN , Aviation Safety Network (English), accessed on February 6, 2019.
- ^ Accident report HS 748 G-ASPL , Aviation Safety Network (English), accessed on January 21, 2016.
Airlines from the United Kingdom , British Overseas Territories and the Crown possessions of the British Crown
