Fabulous Flying Boats
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Afterburner Book Reviews GLOSTER AIRCRAFT COMPANY turbojet engine, led to the order to start on what became the Meteor. After having been the only Allied operational jet aircraft during WW2, the Meteor’s remarkable 34 sub-types later saw service in almost a dozen foreign Air Forces. Development of its successor, the Javelin, its various Marks and proposed successors, is fully described. But less than justice is done to Bill Waterton for his epic attempt to save the fi rst GA5 prototype after losing its By D N James elevators through fl utter. The undercarriage did not collapse Fonthill Media Limited, Millview House, Toadsmoor on touchdown but after Road, Stroud GL5 2TB, UK. 2014. 186pp. increasingly violent hops that Illustrated. £16.99. ISBN 978-1-78155-259-9. ended with him struggling to open the jammed canopy Presented as an update of Derek James’ previous with the wreckage on fi re work Gloster Aircraft since 1917 (Putnam. 1987 — around him. ‘Stepping out virtually second edition), this condensed version is in octavo unscathed’ seems inadequate here format with a soft cover. The story of this historic Top left: The (a fuller account is given next to the Company is told in a continuous narrative, rather Gloster Meteor F8 prototype, control column of WD804, which is preserved VT150, was a modifi ed F4 than as a sequence of reviews of each aircraft type in the National Aerospace Library). airframe with a new tail and Appendices show three-view drawings of an produced, probably a better arrangement for the cockpit canopy. interesting selection of Gloster project designs, a list general reader. Top right: The third production of all aircraft production, recollections of personnel The account runs from the founding of the Gloster Gladiator I, K6131. Above: Gloster Grebes J7400 and occurrences, refl ected in commemorative Company, to take on the WW1 production of and J7385 attached beneath plaques and road names, and an index of Gloster Airco aircraft that had been sub-contracted to the airship R-33 in 1926. aircraft preserved (some still airworthy) in 15 Cheltenham fi rm of H H Martyn. In the lean years of Below: Gloster IVA, N222, at countries. Included are the aircraft now displayed, the inter-war period the name ‘Gloster’ was adopted the Schneider Trophy Contest in Venice in 1927. with many other artefacts, in the new Jet Age to ease the way into export markets where the All RAeS (NAL). Museum on the former Staverton airfi eld, a worthy earlier term ‘Gloucestershire’ could be troublesome fl owering of many years of dedicated persistence by to pronounce. The name survived the take-over by volunteer Gloster enthusiasts Hawker, and the story continues with its famous Further illustrations, including a section with biplanes, WW2 production of over 6,000 Hurricanes colour photographs, support the unfolding narrative, and Typhoons, the Meteor and the Javelin. After though reading the text is interrupted by a number a struggle to diversify, following the infamous of uncorrected typographical errors. However, Defence White Paper of 1957 which decreed ‘no dismay at those errors might be disarmed by one more fi ghters’, came the summary dissolution of the on the fi rst offi cial fl ight of the E.28, stating that the Company in 1964. Regrettably, there is no Index to engine rpm had been run up to 76,500! the account. The selection of Gloster to design the E.28/39, Brian Brinkworth to be the fi rst aircraft powered solely by Whittle’s FREng FRAeS 44 AEROSPACE / MARCH 2015 FABULOUS FLYING BOATS A History of the World’s Passenger Flying Boats By L Dawson Pen & Sword Aviation, Pen & Sword Books, 47 Church St, Barnsley, S Yorkshire S70 2AS, UK. 2013. 320pp. Illustrated. £25. ISBN 978-1-78159-109-3. While the American Wright brothers are perennially lauded for pioneering the age of powered fl ight, soon after the dawn of the 20th century in 1903, the equally courageous pioneering launch of waterborne fl ight, which came only six-and-a-half years later in 1910, is now little remembered. It was the scientifi cally-trained French engineer Henri Fabre, from a ship-owning family, who took the fi rst steps in reconciling the highly-demanding challenge of conjoining the still scarcely-understood science of aerodynamics with that of the much better- known hydrodynamics gathered from some of the rudiments of yacht building and naval architecture. Engagingly In the next three decades the vibrant spirit and captured in vivid dynamism of the development and operation of this detail, with fi rst- inspirational and dual-embracing genus resulted in the huge British, American, French, German and hand accounts Italian commercial fl ying boats of the 1930s that did of piloting and so much towards opening up the main international travelling in arteries of the global air transport system of today. Although almost totally eclipsed by the vast these graceful output of the much more utilitarian land-based behemoths Top: Imperial Airways Short S8 Calcutta. transports and the consequent great proliferation of Above: Sikorsky S40 of Pan American Airways. airfi elds during WW2, military adaptions did go on to Below left: The cabin of a Short ‘C’ Type fl ying boat. fulfi l vital ocean-patrolling and air-sea rescue roles Bottom: Short Solent 4, ZK-AML, Aotearoa II, of TEAL. during the war. The rapid demise of both military All RAeS (NAL). and commercial fl ying boats then came in the early 1950s with the ready availability of the profusion of and museum collections and includes a matching war-surplus capacity and the advent of the jet age. informative appendix. It embraces the full gamut Engagingly captured in vivid detail, with fi rst- of the vital role that they played in linking Europe, hand accounts of piloting and travelling in these Africa, the Far East, Australasia and the Americas graceful behemoths, this prodigiously researched, in days, rather than the weeks and months of detailed and lucid narrative is also well-illustrated traditional sea travel. This they did before their with evocative images from corporate, private land-based equivalents could reliably bridge the major oceans and huge distances that separated the British Empire and the colonial links of other European parent nations — and notably including the famed Empire Air Mail Scheme. This studied treatise is thus far from a simplistic ‘catalogue and calendar’ treatment and is a commendable and defi nitive contextual retrospect and record of an era now subsumed into the fi rst half-century of the evolution of the aeronautical dimension but which must be regarded as one of the most admirable and illustrious chapters of the entire aeronautical plenitude. Dr Norman Barfi eld CEng FRAeS Find us on Twitter i Find us on LinkedIn f Find us on Facebook www.aerosociety.com MARCH 2015 45 Afterburner Book Reviews LIBERALIZATION IN AVIATION selected infrastructure topics, such as airports’ fi nancial performance, ground handling and air navigation systems. Finally, Part E, on public policy, offers some economic assessments on what efforts to liberalise have achieved so far. It also proposes some ways in which liberalisation can proceed. The future challenges are summarised in terms of maintaining achieved benefi ts while seeking to realise some potential additional benefi ts from further liberalisation. It is noted that most national markets are liberalised, while many international markets are not. For achieved benefi ts An A350 XWB of Qatar to be realised more fully, the book prescribes, Competition, Cooperation and Airways. The rise of the Gulf Public Policy carriers receives relatively fi rst and foremost, an effi cient and proactive little attention in this book. competition policy. For additional benefi ts from Edited by P Forsyth et al Airbus. further liberalisation the book identifi es the removal of controls over capacity and over the ownership Ashgate Publishing Limited, Wey Court East, Union and control of airlines as two of the most important Road, Farnham, Surrey GU9 7PT, UK. 2013. 464pp. requirements. £75. ISBN 978-1-4094-5090-0. Despite its length there are several important developments that receive relatively little attention. This is the fi fth in a series of books published in Perhaps the One is the rise of the Gulf carriers (Emirates, Etihad association with the German Aviation Research greatest value and Qatar Airways) and another is the consolidation Society. It is a rather weighty tome containing as taking place in the US airline industry. Reference many as 24 chapters and involving contributions of the book lies to these developments is made en passant in some from no fewer than 36 different authors. It is an in its bringing of the papers but the fact that there is no chapter edited book divided into fi ve parts. together a specifi cally devoted to them lends a certain dated Part A is concerned with various aspects of air to the volume. competition in liberalised airline markets, including large body The research on which the book is based is very market entry, product differentiation, connecting of analytical erudite and generates quite a number of interesting traffi c, thinly traffi cked routes and possible work on airline insights which, in turn, provide much food for thought. implications for safety. Part B focuses on the The conclusions are sensible ones but contain no real emergence and growth of low-cost airlines. There liberalisation, surprises, being very much in accord with what one are two papers on the evolution of low-cost airlines work which might expect anyway. Perhaps the greatest value of Europe and one on the use of à la carte pricing might the book lies in its bringing together a large body of to generate ancillary revenues.