Cowboy1968
Charter Member
I know this is off topic, but Capital Airlines and Pan American had contracts for the Comet II. I would love to find a painter that would be willing to put theses birds in a 1953 Pan Am paint scheme. I am putting two examples of what Pan Paint was back then....though I am sure most of us all ready know.
The Comet was on the verge to become the plane to change commercial aviation, even in the US. As I said both Capital and Pan American had aircraft being built. Talks were being held with four other major US airlines: United, Delta, Eastern and TWA. Lufthansa was looking at the airplane for use on its medium range European divisions. The De Haviland star was shining bright and then it all fail apart with the break ups of both Comet I and Comet II models. When England grounded the comet, PAA quickly canceled all contracts. They instead ordered more Douglas DC-6B aircraft to replace the aging war built DC-4s. Capital followed PAA's lead and canceled the aircraft.
Talks quickly broke down with the other US carriers. The same story was repeated around the World. Air France parked their Comets. When the plane emerged from the redesign in 1959, it was already over for it. DH was only able to gain a few sales, and most of the aircraft of the Comet 4 type were to fill the old orders that hadn't been canceled.
It took DH four years of testing to and redesign to find out what happen to the aircraft in the break ups in the air. The problem was quick metal fatigue caused by rapid and pressurization and depressurization of the cabin while in flight. The skin of the aircraft failed around the joints on the square windows. They fixed the problem by switching to windows like you see on planes today and putting a stronger skin on the plane. It is ironic that Boeing, who had closely followed the invistagation of the Comet and the experiance they had gained from their military contracts and developement had already figured out that the windows were the possible short coming of the Comet. they avoided that in the production planes by using proper windows to begin with on the 707.
So goes the life of the DH.106 Comet.
Now the strong point was the fact, was that the Comet had been designed from the outset to use the existing fields. They were able to simply fly anywhere that a strip was paved and long enough to take a DC-4 or DC-6. On the other hand the 707 was developed out of a military aircraft. This lead to the problem of the ship needing military style heavy and long runways. That limited the usefulness until the mid 60's of this type of plane.
What could have been?
I still think this bird would have looked sweet wearing its PAA paint scheme.And i can just see the Comet flying the "meatball express" as well.
The Comet was on the verge to become the plane to change commercial aviation, even in the US. As I said both Capital and Pan American had aircraft being built. Talks were being held with four other major US airlines: United, Delta, Eastern and TWA. Lufthansa was looking at the airplane for use on its medium range European divisions. The De Haviland star was shining bright and then it all fail apart with the break ups of both Comet I and Comet II models. When England grounded the comet, PAA quickly canceled all contracts. They instead ordered more Douglas DC-6B aircraft to replace the aging war built DC-4s. Capital followed PAA's lead and canceled the aircraft.
Talks quickly broke down with the other US carriers. The same story was repeated around the World. Air France parked their Comets. When the plane emerged from the redesign in 1959, it was already over for it. DH was only able to gain a few sales, and most of the aircraft of the Comet 4 type were to fill the old orders that hadn't been canceled.
It took DH four years of testing to and redesign to find out what happen to the aircraft in the break ups in the air. The problem was quick metal fatigue caused by rapid and pressurization and depressurization of the cabin while in flight. The skin of the aircraft failed around the joints on the square windows. They fixed the problem by switching to windows like you see on planes today and putting a stronger skin on the plane. It is ironic that Boeing, who had closely followed the invistagation of the Comet and the experiance they had gained from their military contracts and developement had already figured out that the windows were the possible short coming of the Comet. they avoided that in the production planes by using proper windows to begin with on the 707.
So goes the life of the DH.106 Comet.
Now the strong point was the fact, was that the Comet had been designed from the outset to use the existing fields. They were able to simply fly anywhere that a strip was paved and long enough to take a DC-4 or DC-6. On the other hand the 707 was developed out of a military aircraft. This lead to the problem of the ship needing military style heavy and long runways. That limited the usefulness until the mid 60's of this type of plane.
What could have been?
I still think this bird would have looked sweet wearing its PAA paint scheme.And i can just see the Comet flying the "meatball express" as well.
Botswana, or Bechuanaland as it was until independence in 1966. Forgot to mention this country with the maps above. It, too, was blessed with a good first free leader, Sir Seretse Khama. He had to tread a delicate diplomatic tightrope squashed between Apartheid South Africa and equally-race obsessed white Rhodesia, but succeeded. Despite not having much in the way of natural resources, Botswana remains a tranquil democracy, recently much better-known through the highly readable Number One Ladies' Detective Agency novels about Maa Precious Ramotswe (by Scottish lawyer Alexander McCall Smith - and on TV now). So at 12.16 we tune into their ATC, Gabarone Centre, but fly over Francistown:
