The good burghers of Southend took little time before complaining about Channel’s jet operations. The 1-11 had arrived in June 1967 and, in October 1967, the Town Council voted to restrict the number of jet take-offs (1). Of course, it was a municipally-owned airport and the council had every right to restrict the operations of one of the town’s prime companies. However, there had been previous moves to extend both runways 06/24 and 15/33 which would have made jet take-offs quieter and more economical. Questions were asked in Parliament in July 1967 regarding the progress of the runway extension study but there was little response. Channel’s only real option was to move its jet operations base from Southend to Stansted. The north-west Essex airfield had a long runway and was considered likely to become London’s third airport. It was, however, remote and lacked the rail link which was so useful at Southend. A large percentage of the Inclusive Tour work moved to Stansted with the jets and a Viscount feeder service was set-up from Southend. The Viscounts also continued with IT flights to Brindisi, Gerona, Mahon, Venice, Genoa and Zurich while the jets operated to Athens, Barcelona, the Canaries, Djerba, Faro, Gerona, Ibiza, Jerez, Lisbon, Mahon, Malaga, Malta, Naples, Palma, Pula, Rimini, Rome, Split, Tunis and Venice. With IT flights also operated from Teesside and Edinburgh, Bristol and Cardiff, Channel had moved from a predominantly short-range, low-cost, cross-channel operator to a longer-range IT airline; in terms of passenger miles, scheduled services now accounted-for only around 10% of the total. Dan Air, always predominantly a holiday airline, generated only 5% of its business from scheduled services prior to its purchase of Skyways.
Some earlier commercial practices remained: Viscounts G-AVHE and G-AVNJ were leased to Air Ferry from January to October/ November 1968. A further Viscount, G-APPU, was destroyed in a landing accident at Southend when it slid-off the runway when inbound from Rotterdam on May 4th (2). The last of the 700 series Viscounts, G-APZC and G-APTA, were withdrawn from service at the end of the 1968 season along with, perhaps surprisingly, the first of the 812s, G-APPC. The move-up to jets hadn’t changed Channel’s approach to seating either: the BAC 1-11s were maxed-out at 99 seats and the tourists on the Tridents had the ability to book seven-abreast ‘family seats’ – reputedly so fraternal that there were no armrests!
(1) Southend Echo 19/8/2023.
(2) G-APPU passenger Ian Brixey described on Facebook his survival of the non-fatal accident on May 4th when G-APPU ran off the end of the runway in wet weather, crashed through the boundary fence and brought-down the overhead power cables of the adjacent railway line. A previous incident with a Falcon Airways Hermes had prompted, he says, the installation of an automatic trip-switch for the rail power. The fuselage broke apart ahead of the wings and 21 passengers were injured. Uninjured passengers were taken to the terminal and given a cup of tea before going home.
Jack Jones also had some new commercial ideas in 1968 and hoped to diversify from the IT market which was contested by so many other operators. Channel’s ex-neighbour at Southend, Freddie Laker, had also acquired BAC 1-11s in 1967 and was running them in conjunction with two Britannia turboprops on charter, leasing and IT work with his new airline. By 1969, Laker had obtained clearance to operate charters between Europe and the USA using ex-British Eagle 707s fitted with 158 seats. The affinity charter,in particular, had been pioneered by Caledonian Airways and Laker and Jones must have nurtured ambitions to launch transatlantic flights themselves. Departing for a 10-day visit to Washington, Jones lobbied for CAB permission to operate the flights (3) and, reportedly, fitted in time to discuss purchasing two Boeing 707-120s from his previous pals at Continental. These were for sale in late 1968 and, with their golden jet colours, would have been a good aesthetic fit for Channel. However, like the earlier car ferry plans, the project came to nothing – probably just as well given Dan Air and other operators subsequent challenging experiences with a couple of 707s on the North Atlantic route.
(3) Key Aero article by Bruce Hales-Dutton, Feb 5th 2023.
Channel’s plans moved towards an increased presence in the scheduled market. The problem with the domestic market was that, although BEA seemed well-disposed towards Channel when selling them aircraft, this magnanimity didn’t extend to route allocations. BEA were the establishment and they fought just about every route application made by independent airlines. Nonetheless, Jack Jones had a vision for a ‘bus stop’ route down the east coast of Britain from Aberdeen to Portsmouth. Channel were not alone in ambitions of this kind – Dan Air were applying for a similar route concept operating Newcastle to Bristol via a, mostly, west-coast route. Perhaps surprisingly, when Channel applied for their licence, the ATLB acquiesced and, in May 1967, granted permission for Aberdeen- Edinburgh- Newcastle- Teesside- Leeds- East Midlands- Luton- Southend- Portsmouth.
In Autumn 1967, Channel cranked-up their most glamourous golden airliner, BAC 1-11 G-AVGP, for a proving flight carrying Press and Politicians along all of the Eastern ‘Bus Stop’ route with the exception of non-Jet-Friendly Portsmouth. It was, nonetheless, apparent that the route would be flown by turboprop equipment: Viscount 812s plus HS748s for Portsmouth. Similarly, the economic slump at the time meant that the airline wouldn’t start the service for another fifteen months. While the concept had potential it also had, by 1969, some disadvantages. Firstly, the southern sector incorporated Channel’s existing feeder services from East Midlands and Portsmouth into Southend while the northern section could do the same for Channel’s IT services out of both Edinburgh and Teesside. However, Portsmouth had been removed from Channel’s route map by 1969 and many of the London area IT flights had shifted their origin from Southend to Stansted. The North Sea oil industry had been expanding ever since the discovery of the West Sole gas field in 1965 and Aberdeen, Teesside and Great Yarmouth all appeared likely to benefit. Channel added further feeder services from Norwich (for Yarmouth) to East Midlands and also intended to link-in England’s maritime capital of Liverpool. The service was named ‘The Scottish Flyer’ and the title duly applied to HS748 G-ATEI and Viscount G-AVHK and the first Northbound service flown on January 20th 1969. Both South and Northbound routes were flown the following day with Southend to Aberdeen via the six intermediate stops taking about four hours. This demanded very quick turnarounds at each airport but, in the late sixties, Channel were the equivalent of today’s Red Bull F1 team and ground stops were frequently between 10 and 15 minutes! Passengers could be boarded particularly quickly on the HS748, less so on the Viscount. However, the latter had one advantage over the 748; it had been fitted with extra batteries which enabled it to restart the engines without the need for a ground-handling trolley. Less encouragingly, the turnarounds could be fast because there were less customers than anticipated. If flying between Southend and Scotland, it was potentially faster to take the train to Heathrow and board a direct BEA flight. the service was also a little ahead of its time for the oil industry: it would be another year before BP discovered the Forties field and kick-started large scale offshore development with the need for crew-change flights, courier services and business travel between North Sea ports. The HS748 was removed from the service and leased to Transair Canada in May 1969 and never flew for Channel again. Despite a move to two full round trips per day in June 1969, the route wasn’t as successful as expected. The last Viscount flight was operated on November 28th 1969 with the airline reporting that it had amassed losses of 160,000 pounds. By way of comparison, it must be noted that Dan Air had also introduced a ‘Link City’ service in July 1969 connecting Newcastle (and briefly Teesside) with Manchester, Bristol and Cardiff. Although the northern sector seemed to have much potential, Cambrian Airways fought fiercely, and ultimately unsuccessfully, to keep Dan Air out.
Dan Air had taken a big risk in buying a 26-seater Nord 262 for their Link City routes. The French high-wing airliner had never been operated in the UK but, as with the HS748, was reputed to be a Dakota replacement. Delivered late, the Nord 262 was replaced on early services by….Dakota G-AMPP. When 262 G-AYFR did enter service, its speed enabled it to fly varying route configurations between Newcastle, Manchester, Liverpool, Birmingham, Bristol and Cardiff two or three times per day. As with Channel, Dan Air placed great emphasis on a fast turn-around with an ambition of being halted on the tarmac for as little as five minutes. While 10 minutes seemed more representative, there is no doubt that very short stops were feasible given the 262’s airstairs and extra batteries for engine starting. The 262 had a 60% break-even load factor and being a smaller aircraft than the HS748 had advantages as well as disadvantages. Dan Air appeared to be able to make money where Channel could not and the service was continued into 1971. A new route was approved connecting Bournemouth to Manchester and Newcastle with onward options of Liverpool and Birmingham. This was straying into Channel’s zone of influence, the Southend airline having switched Portsmouth services to Hurn in the late sixties. In the event, Dan Air’s use of the Nord 262 only lasted until early 1972 when the purchase of Skyways International for 650,000 pounds gifted them four HS748s and the inspiration to expand both British and European scheduled routes.
Channel’s finances hadn’t been too bleak through the mid-sixties despite the economic downturn: 1965 had generated profits of 726,000 pounds, 1966 765,000 pounds, 1967 730,000 pounds and, while 1968 had produced a lower 520,000 pounds on a turnover of 4.5 million, profits were still above airlines such as Laker and Court Line who were reporting between 400k and 500k profits for 1969 (3). Channel undoubtedly sustained a couple of serious losses with the Scottish Flyer and, again, when they felt obliged to cancel future orders for the 1-11 and Trident with the resulting forfeited deposits. Attempts to expand internal UK services linking Liverpool to East Midlands also failed to generate the kind of income needed to bolster the seasonal IT income.
Their fleet was also causing some concern – the BAC 1-11 was a good airliner and was performing well for BEA, British United, Autair, Laker and Dan Air, but it wasn’t totally suitable for Channel. As with the Tridents, the 1-11s weren’t welcomed by local residents at Southend and their operation from Stansted led to the added costs of having two bases. The Viscount 812s were beginning to show their age; they had all flown high hours with Continental and were now edging up on 30,000 flying hours. With the last of the HS748s sold, Jack Jones made what was possibly a strange choice for a new type when he began to build-up a selection of DH Herons.
The six-strong fleet of Herons was built-up from late 1968 with a view to using them on feeder services from Norwich to East Midlands and on the services from more primitive airfields. Although the initial customers for the small airliners had been all over the World (4), they had gradually percolated back to the UK as they were replaced by more modern turboprops. With Gypsy Queen engines, plentiful spares availability and a cheap purchase price the choice looked like a move from the classic days of Channel.
The Heron 1B, however, had a fixed undercarriage and had experienced issues with wing spars. The four engines were viewed as an excellent safety feature by pilots and passengers alike but, on a airliner which can carry 20 passengers at a push, they meant a lot of engine maintenance per passenger mile. Later model Herons did offer an upgrade route to a stretched two-engined Riley variant and Channel might have been better advised to purchase Mk2 models. The purchase price would probably have been a deciding factor with the first two aircraft bought from fellow Southend residents Keegan Aviation over the winter of 1968/ 69.
(4) The six Herons purchased by Channel had originally flown for Braathens SAFE (Norway), Garuda (Indonesia), PLUNA in Uruguay, Butler Air Transport in Australia and Dragon Airways in Britain.
The first Heron to arrive, G-ANCI, had served with many UK airlines on leases from companies associated with Lord Calthorpe: Overseas Air Transport, Mercury, North-South Airlines. On November 4th 1968 the Heron was registered to Keegan Aviation at Southend and, a fortnight later, it passed to ‘Tradair’. It flew its first flight for Channel on November 20th on a, presumably, under-subscribed Viscount service between Southend and Rotterdam. As with several of Channel’s ‘bargain’ purchases, it can’t be said to have given long operational service as it operated its final flight less than a year later on 30th September 1969. The second Heron, G-AOZM, had also buzzed around Britain quite extensively with Silver City and Dan Air prior to being bought by Keegan Aviation (for the second time) on 29th November 1968. It was turned-over to new owners ‘Tradair’ on 22nd January 1969 and made its first Channel flight on the feeder service between Southend and Castle Donington on 18th February. One year and two days later on 20th February 1970, it made its final flight returning from Ostend to Southend a day before C of A expiry. While these two Herons were operational, Channel added three more Herons, all one-time members of Gulf Aviation’s fleet which had served with the BOAC-affiliated company from Bahrain since the late fifties. These would have been well-maintained aircraft and had probably been part-exchanged when the Heron fleet was replaced by Beechcraft Queen Airs. The problem was that they had been standing awaiting a new owner for around two years with Aerocontacts (Aircraft Distributors) at Shobdon and the Certificates of Airworthiness had expired in 1967 and 68. G-APKV was delivered from Shobdon to the new owners, again ‘Tradair’, at Southend on 12th September 1969. It had probably been ear-marked as a spares source and it never entered service.
The second ex-Gulf Heron, G-AMUK, was owned by Flying Facilities, an associate of Aerocontacts, and was ferried from Shobdon to join ‘Tradair’ on September 17th. It also failed to enter service and remained in store in Gulf colours at Southend. The final ex-Gulf aircraft, G-APKW, arrived at Southend from Leavesden on July 29th 1969 having been sold by Aerocontacts two days earlier. ‘KW had been due to go on lease to Congolese Third Level operator Cogeair during summer 1969 and had been flown to Leavesden from Birmingham for overhaul on July 11th. It was therefore in reasonable flying condition and was able to enter service with Channel on September 3rd as their fourth Heron. It continued flying with the airline until February 29th 1972 when it had the distinction of making Channel’s last flight, landing at Southend at 19:54 inbound from Ostend. It was also the only Channel aircraft to carry ‘Air England’ titles. Meanwhile, a third Heron, G-AXFH, had been purchased from Shackleton Aviation and flown-in from their Coventry base on 21st May 1969. It went straight into service and served until a final flight with Channel on October 18th 1971. It was later sold-on to Peters Aviation.
The 1969 arrival of the Herons meant that services between Portsmouth and the Channel islands could be resumed. The final turbine-powered flight between Ipswich and Southend had been flown on October 17th 1967 and the inauguration of Heron flights enabled the resumption of this feeder service along with Norwich to Southend operations. The Southend to Channel Island routes would also be flown by Herons during the months of low demand and they could also deputise for the Viscounts on Southend to Ostend and Rotterdam schedules during the disappointing month of January 1970. Herons also flew some charters, carried some freight; they were versatile, if old. It seems likely that the old De Havillands were boosting Channel’s cost efficiency although, despite a respray in the new livery, they did little for Channel’s ‘Golden Jet’ image.
The purchase of the ‘extra’ ex-Gulf airframes led to some debate as to whether a ‘Super Heron’ conversion was being planned. Florida aero engineer Riley Aircraft had carved out a niche up-rating De Havilland hardware and modified both Herons and Doves, mostly by swapping-out the original Gypsy Queens for lighter, more powerful Lycoming Flat 6 and Flat 8 aero engines. As avowed Gypsy Queen enthusiasts, Channel may not have been impressed with this upgrade. Keegan Aviation, long-term Dove vendor and supplier of two of Channel’s Herons, however, were heavily involved with Riley’s Dove upgrades. A production line had been set-up by McAlpine at Luton and Keegans had been appointed as the sales agent for the Riley Dove. Channel were definitely keen on stretched Doves and bought three ex-Morton Airways aircraft in September 1967. Interestingly, given the UK involvement in the Riley project, Channel’s plans centred on the conversion of the Doves to Carstedt CJ-600 specification This created an eighteen-seater mini airliner powered by twin Garrett TPE 331 turboprop engines driving Hartzell propellers. This meant that a Dove could be stretched with the insertion of a 2.13m mid section to be virtually the same size as the modified Herons being built by Canada’s Saunders Aircraft in Montreal (interestingly, with some input from Southend’s Aviation Traders). This is not entirely surprising as modules of the original Herons and Doves were built on the same jigs by DeHavilland. Neither the Saunders ST-27 conversion of the Heron nor Carstedt’s CJ600a mega-Dove were commercially successful with only around a dozen of the former constructed and six of the latter. Channel Airways had viewed the ST-27 demonstrator but hadn’t shown any further interest. The Dove-stretching exercise was aborted and the registrations of the three ex-Morton aircraft were cancelled in August 1968.
Moving emphasis from Channel’s scheduled feeder services to the airline’s main money spinner, the Inclusive Tour industry, the spotlight in 1968 was on another De Havilland design, this time the Trident. Channel liked the image created by their new Tridents and BAC 1-11s but neither really achieved their potential with the airline. Laker proved able to stretch the range of their 1-11s by clever management but also because their base at Gatwick had a suitably long runway for take-offs at maximum loading. They were able to offer their tour operator clients direct flights to Tenerife providing that the seating capacity was no more than seventy – nonetheless, a lot fewer than Channel’s optimum capacity. The direct flight also required clement weather, a reduced-thrust take-off and a steady climb to a higher flight level than would be normal. So it was understandable that Channel’s 1-11 operations from Southend’s limited runway concentrated on shorter routes in order to maximise passenger numbers at the expense of fuel. Channel’s 1-11s couldn’t match the range of Britannia’s Boeing 737s and they were considered very noisy by Southend residents. Future jet operations therefore seemed destined for Stansted. A big new 5 million pound contract was signed with Lyons Tours in April 1969 to cover the 1970, 71 and 72 holiday seasons. The agreement stipulated jet hardware and Channel would need to add to its fleet. The airline had been unable to maintain the financing to complete the purchase of the ordered 1-11s and Tridents and needed to quickly supplement their fleet with a reasonably-priced, proven airliner.
Between May 1966 and October 1967, Dan Air, Channel’s IT competitor, had bought four ex-BOAC Comet 4s and had entered the 1967 holiday season as the first holiday airline flying pure jets. Following strengthening of the floors, the first aircraft were fitted with 99 seats, mostly in 5-abreast configuration. By the early 1970 holiday season, Dan Air were operating eleven Comet 4s with up to 106 seats on each. Channel decided that it could emulate this success with the small fleet of Comet 4bs then on sale with BEA. The 4b version had a shorter range than Dan Air’s Comet 4s but would have appealed to Channel as it could be fitted with 109 seats. Five Comets had been parked at Marshall’s of Cambridge for some months; they comprised four aircraft which had been registered to BEA in 1960 prior to two being sold, two leased to Olympic Airlines. The fifth airliner was the long-serving G-APMB which had been with BEA since 1958 and had flown the airline’s first jet service. On August 27th 1969, Channel announced that it had bought the ‘Cambridge Five’ for under 2 million pounds.
The Comets were considered to be suitable for the longer IT routes while the BAC 1-11s could fly the shorter sectors and the six remaining Viscount 812s could pick-up scheduled routes, day trips and ad hoc charters. Two of the Viscount 812s were kept in service during the March 1970 cross-channel ferry strike but were subsequently retired during May. The last HS748 was out on charter to Rousseau Aviation until August 1970 when it returned to Southend and was sold in the Far East. The two Tridents continued with their 149-seat IT flights for companies which included Channel’s Mediterranean Holidays and the eponymous Trident Holidays.
The first two Comets arrived at Stansted on 26th January 1970. G-APYC had been SX-DAK with Olympic Airways, G-APYD was ex-SX-DAL. The colour schemes remained blue and white – Channel titles were added, the Olympic rings painted-out but little else changed; a pity, as the Comet would have looked great in the ‘Golden Jet’ livery. The other Comets from Cambridge arrived during April and May and stubbornly resisted any repainting. As from May 1970, the Lyons Tours flights were operated by the Comets from Birmingham, Bristol, Glasgow, Manchester and Newcastle as well as Stansted. The fifth Comet, G-APMB, had been painted in BEA’s black colour scheme with the red logos painted over and Channel titles added. Photos seem to suggest that BEA’s red upper wing paint remained. Although it had been considered that G-APMB might become a spares queen, it was put into service and was soon seen in Channel titles across Britain and Europe.
Indeed, as with Channel’s Trident pair, the airline had a very low spares complement which led to serious serviceability issues. Dan Air had been continuing to hoover-up available Comets across the World and eventually owned nineteen Comet 4 aircraft, fifteen Comet 4bs and fifteen Comet 4c jets: a total of 49 out of the 114 Comets built (5). Channel were therefore in a very competitive market for Comet spares. Dan Air, themselves having occasional parts issues, had acquired Comets from Malaysia, Argentina and East African Airways for spares; Channel, desperately short of even quite basic parts were not beyond trying to borrow parts from Dan! Eventually, Dan Air were able to purchase ex-Mexicana Comet XA-NAP in June 1971 and it was flown to Stansted where it was dismantled for spares and eventually ended-up at the Board of Trade Fire Service Training School. One of the ex-Olympic Comets was also broken-up; G-ARDI was withdrawn in September 1971, shortly after the arrival of the Mexican machine. It was dismantled at Southend after becoming the only Channel Comet to fly into the airfield.
(5) Comet data from www.duxfordaviationsociety.org
Channel was not the only airline with issues during 1969/ 70; the mighty British United was losing money for owners Air Holdings. Laker Airways approached the BUA management, BUA approached both BEA and BOAC and, amazingly, Channel were rumoured to be interested in buying the ailing operator. The source of finance would almost certainly have been a problem for the family-owned company. Dan Air had no ambitions to buy BUA but they did aspire to a greater available cash pile. The parent company, Davies and Newman Holdings, floated successfully on the stock market during autumn 1971 and the airline was capitalised at around 5.5 million pounds. Channel had no similar buffer.
In September 1970 there was some good news for Channel when it was awarded a further very large contract for operating IT flights out of Berlin on behalf of three German travel agents. The eleven million pound deal covered up to fifty flights per week from Berlin Tegel and Templehof airfields to destinations across southern Europe. Berlin had already proved to be a sound source of revenue for Dan Air and Channel had also operated flights out of Templehof. For the 1971 season, one Channel BAC 1-11 and one Trident were to be detached to operate from Tegel. There were, however, spares issues with the Tridents as well as the Comets and, while G-AVYB operated out of Berlin, sister G-AVYE was left sitting engineless at Stansted. For an aircraft with a book value as high as the Trident to be parked-up mid-season as a spares donor was nothing short of disastrous for Channel. It may also say something about the way Hawker Siddeley assisted its clients and was probably positive news for the Boeing 727 sales team.
During 1971, Channel carried a creditable 386,400 IT passengers but, at the end of the summer, the two Tridents were sold to BEA. They had only flown an average of 894 hours each during the year while the Viscounts hadn’t fared much better at an average of 961 hours. Summer 1971 had seen the Viscount 812s operating chiefly on day trips to Rotterdam and Beauvais, regular scheduled services to the Channel Islands, Rotterdam and Ostend plus some ad hoc charters and a new service between Southend and Dusseldorf. 156,000 scheduled passengers had been carried during the year but load factors had been below 55%. While the Herons had led to the re-opening of the services between Norwich and Southend and Ipswich and Southend, both terminated in mid-October. The Heron fleet dropped to one with the withdrawal of G-AXFH and one of the four Viscounts was withdrawn from use. There was a general feeling that Channel had lost the golden touch and was running-down. The Comets had been the top performers with regard to flying hours with an average of 1307 hours. They had high airframe hours, spares issues and had been insufficiently reliable, often leading to Channel subcontracting other operators. The end of the 1971 season had seen not only the sale of the Tridents but also the parking-up of the Comets and the two BAC 1-11s. Limited operations were maintained with the four Viscounts, the Heron and the Dove. Even the utilisation of the propeller fleet was low during winter with some days featuring only one airliner operating all the services from Southend. An 83-seat Viscount might fly the Rotterdam route with only 8 or 9 passengers.
The engineering base at Stansted was closed at the end of January 1972 in an attempt to reduce overheads. The Airline’s banker, Barclays, was nervous: with the collapse of two well-established names in Spring 1968 (British Eagle) and January 1971 (Skyways) plus BUA’s shotgun marriage with Caledonian, there was little confidence in the British aviation industry. On February 1st 1972, the bank appointed Kenneth Cork of restructuring experts Cork Gully as Receiver; as if to prove their point, the airline carried a total of 33 passengers on the following day. A sad decline from the peak days of the mid-sixties.
In the first few days, the Receiver attempted to drum-up interest in buying the airline or its assets. They stated that there was ‘no question’ of Channel halting operations completely and that they had been in talks with British Air Ferries with a view to a merger. BAF was also an airline in a state of flux; they were experiencing the same problems as Channel with their cross-channel scheduled services. The car ferry flights from Southend and Lydd to Le Touquet and Ostend had lost much of their appeal and BAF was moving to reinvent itself as a passenger and freight operation. Following the sale of BAF to Mike Keegan in October 1971, the way forward was still evolving and the airline would have been quite happy to see the departure of a competitor from Southend to Ostend and Channel Island routes. BAF wasn’t a jet operation and was unlikely to become one; they may have been interested in Channel Airways licences, but were unlikely to want anything else (6). BAC 1-11 G-AWKJ had been flown to Southend the preceding October and was now shuttled to BAC at Hurn for storage. It was subsequently sold back to BAC and went on to become the Presidential aircraft of the Philippines. G-AWEJ remained at Southend a lot longer, departing to join Cambrian on 5th September 1973, still in Channel colours. The Receiver halted all jet operations as from February and the few flights across the English Channel and to Jersey & Guernsey were maintained by the Viscounts and Heron G-APKW. Channel’s Chief Pilot, Peter Lockwood, had perceived that the airline had signed the 3-year deal for IT work out of Berlin and that the two remaining seasons could, potentially, be valuable. His attempts to buy two ex-American Airlines BAC 1-11s and establish a new airline, Orientair, to fly these routes ended in acrimony. Orientair did receive a single 1-11 at BAC’s Hurn workshop and renegotiation of the contracts may have had some success. However, it is possible that Channel Airways and the Receiver threatened legal action and the routes were eventually transferred to Dan Air, already a major player in the Berlin market.
The airline industry, however, seemed to be in a permanent death loop and, in 1972, was joined by the inclusive tour business. Damaged by continual price-cutting, Clarksons would lose 4.8 million pounds in 1972, Thomsons 1.6 million and Reitz’s Horizon Holidays 388,000 pounds. The early optimism from the Receiver that a buyer would be found for Channel proved unjustified and 250 staff were dismissed without notice on February 20th 1972. The following day, Manchester Corporation impounded one of the Comets in lieu of landing/ parking fees. The airline’s final flight was made on 29th February by Heron G-APKW on the Ostend to Southend route.
Indeed, the bleak outlook for aviation in 1972 was compounded by the OPEC oil price spike of 1973. Aviation in Britain was in a bad place and, although it seems possible that Channel Airways could have been briefly saved for at least another season, it seems unlikely that it would have thrived in the mid-seventies. Other airlines which closed-down included Lloyd International (June 1972), Kestrel (November 1972), Donaldson International (August 1974) and Macedonian (November 1974). Skyways International was absorbed into Dan Air in February 1972. With such contraction in the British industry, the sale of Channel as a going concern was a tall order and the disposal of the airline’s assets became a fire sale which stretched into the summer of 1972.
(6) BAF did, subsequently, lease an ex-Channel Viscount, G-AVIW, from Alidair for six months in 1973. Otherwise, Keegan wanted to use his Transmeridian CL-44Ds on vehicle and freight flights.
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