Monday, Apr. 14, 1952

BOAC's Challenge

British Overseas Airways Corp., which hopes to grab the lead in commercial aviation by flying the first jet transports on regular routes, announced that early next month it will start its 36-passenger Comet jetliner on weekly service to Johannesburg. With a cruising speed of 490 m.p..h., the Comet is scheduled to make the 6,724-mile run (five stops en route) in the flying time of 18 hours and 40 minutes, 12 hours less than current schedules.

Last week the airline also had good news for the British government, which owns it, and which has been stuck with yearly losses as big as $33 million. BOAC Managing Director Whitney Straight reported that in the fiscal year ended in March, BOAC would probably show a net profit of about -L-500,000 ($1,400,000), the first profit in its history.

New Kudos. That was another medal for Whitney Straight's already heavily decorated chest. Straight, who was born in New York,*raised in England, and became a British citizen in 1936, was an R.A.F. pilot during World War II. He shot down at least three planes, won both the Military Cross for valor and the Distinguished Flying Cross, toward war's end helped run Britain's Transport Group as an air commodore. When he took on the BOAC job five years ago, even his friends thought he was showing bravery far beyond the call of duty. BOAC had a bewildering variety of planes, most of them obsolete ex-bombers, patrol boats, etc.

But Straight had already proved that he could make money running an airline. Right after finishing Cambridge, Straight got interested in planes, and founded

Straight Corp., Ltd. He soon found himself controlling 23 airlines, including Western, busiest in the British Isles. Straight, who was just 34 when he took on the -L-5,000-a-year BOAC job, used his private-enterprising know-how in the Socialist government's airline. He started lopping the payroll, soon trimmed the staff from 24,000 to 16,000. He hacked off some of BOAC's worst money-losing runs, began junking obsolete planes and, like a practical businessman, went after the best planes to replace them even if they didn't happen to be British. Over the protests of "Britain-first" politicos, he bought Constellations and Boeing Stratocruisers.

Straight was solidly backed by BOAC's chairman, Sir Miles Thomas, 55, a production man who had made his name at Lord Nuffield's Morris Motors, Ltd. An aggressive salesman, Sir Miles, unlike blunt, outspoken Straight, was also able to maintain smooth relations with Whitehall and keep Parliament off Straight's back.

New Planes. Their teamwork got results. When Straight began his pruning, BOAC had an incredible break-even "load factor" of 115%, would have been losing money even if every seat on every flight was filled. Gradually, Straight and Sir Miles got this down to its present 65%. Profits began to roll in even before Britain boosted airmail rates last August.

With his new Comet service, Straight is banking on jets to make BOAC one of Britain's biggest dollar-earners. By June, the line will have five Comets on hand, be able to step up the Johannesburg flights to thrice weekly. When four more Comets are received, probably by year's end, BOAC hopes to launch Comet service between New York and Bermuda and New York and the Bahamas. Because of its rapid fuel consumption and limited range, BOAC can't use the Comet on the rich North Atlantic run. But it has ordered eleven of the Comet Us, a bigger, longer-ranged version, which it hopes to put into Atlantic service by 1955, and which theoretically will be able to fly from London to New York in six hours, depending on head winds. Actually, the jet's big fuel consumption may well lengthen the time by a stop en route. But by then, Straight has good reason to hope that both Britain's and the U.S.'s swift progress in the perfection of bigger and more economical jet engines will make possible nonstop jet transports. With the advantage of its jet experience, BOAC hopes to have everybody else trailing its blast.

*Grandson of William C. Whitney, Cleveland's Secretary of the Navy, who built a $100 million fortune from trains, trams and tobacco. Whitney's father, Willard, was a Morgan partner who founded the New Republic, which Whitney's brother, Michael, still hopefully runs.

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