commerci - FlightGlobal

FLIGHT, 27 May 1960
719
Dreams and Reality: An
Assessment of Progress in
Passenger and Freight
Helicopter Operations
By JOHN W. R. TAYLOR
COMMERCI
Sabena's S-58s link twelve cities in Belgium, Holland, France and Germany
B
Y the end of 1960 Aeroflot plans to operate 216 helicopter
lines in the Soviet Union, of a total route-length of 6,200
miles. Services are already in operation at Yalta, Simferopol,
Sochi and neighbouring points, and it is intended to extend the
network to cover the Far East, Eastern Siberia, Central Asia, the
Caucasus, Syktyvkar and Baku, using Mi-4s throughout.
All the Moscow airports are to have feeder services running
from a site in the city, probably near the Leningradskoye Shosse
in the north. It also seems likely that Aeroflot will run a Moscow Leningrad helicopter service, to avoid the present time-wasting
45-minute journey from the city centre to Sheremetivo—the point
of departure for Leningrad—which nearly doubles the overall time
taken to reach that city by air. These facts were given to Flight
by Aeroflot, no doubt with considerable pride, via A. W. Collard,
commercial assistant to BEA's manager in Russia.
The city traffic problem mentioned above is not, of course,
peculiar to Moscow. In fact, we could substitute "London Airport"
for "Sheremetivo" and "Paris" for "Leningrad" to spotlight our
own comparable air traveller's deterrent. The difference is that we
are doing very little about it. The fault does not lie with BEA,
which is in business primarily to carry people in fixed-wing
airliners and try to make money by doing so. The national Press
would delight in publicizing the heavy losses that would result
from operating a shuttle service between London and its airport
with the helicopters at present available; and there is no indication that the Government would be prepared to underwrite such
losses by heavy subsidies. T o this extent it is right that BEA
should wait until more economical equipment is available; but
from the helicopter manufacturers' viewpoint this might be too late.
Eventually a decision will have to be taken on the ultimate
form of city-to-airport transportation for London, and the muchadvocated monorail has such enormous advantages over the helicopter in terms of all-weather capabilities, reduced noise and
absence of air traffic control problems that it must offer the greater
attraction. It would be costly to install; but it is significant that
the Russians are already planning to link Vnukovo Airport to
the city's south-western suburbs with a nine-mile overhead railway, on which 75-passenger coaches will travel at up to 100 m.p.h.
Airport feeder services are only one of many applications for
the transport helicopter; but it would be a mistake to underestimate their importance. As the maps on page 721 show, all
three of America's helicopter airlines have based their operations
on this type of work. If we study the present route-network of
Chicago Helicopter Airways we find that it consists of a triangle
of services from Meigs Field in the Chicago Loop to Midway and
O'Hare Airports, with suburban services to Winnetka, 111, and
Gary, Ind. Last year CHA carried a world record total of 204,389
passengers on these routes, of whom approximately 50 per cent
travelled on tickets issued by other US domestic and foreign
airlines.
This interline co-operation has been a major factor in CHA s
rapid growth. All major airlines can issue a through ticket to
include a CHA flight, and the helicopter line can offer similar
services in return. As a result, a passenger to or from Chicago
has no need to buy additional tickets or follow up his luggage
when changing from helicopter to fixed-wing airliner or vice versa.
Nor are the operators' benefits one-sided. American Airlines have
lost no time in advertising the fact that people living in Chicago's
North Shore suburbs are now only four-and-a-half hours from
San Francisco "by Helicopter and Jet Flagship."
As in Britain, the advent of high-speed jet travel has made the
anachronism of slow city-to-airport road transportation even more
apparent. Chicago has its traffic bottlenecks, and many a passenger
carried from New York to O'Hare Field in 75 minutes has rebelled
at the prospect of taking as long to go by taxi from there to
downtown Chicago. CHA, with a passenger fleet of eight Sikorsky
S-58s, does the trip in 11 minutes, and with 158 services a day
over the network there is little waiting for the rotary-wing taxi.
Thanks to a generous government subsidy, fares are not high.
On the run from O'Hare to Meigs Field the helicopter fare is
$6.60 (£2 7s) compared with $7.50 (£2 13s) by taxi. From Midway
the taxi is cheaper, but at the cost of a journey time of 40-70min,
against 7min by helicopter. Little wonder that local residents use
the services as they would a bus, a typical regular customer being
the pilot of a local company's executive aircraft; by flying CHA
he saves about ten hours a week in commuting time.
Here, then, is an object-lesson in how to build up a thriving
operating company and give the public first-class service, even
with equipment that is far from ideal for the job it has to do.
The whole business is made possible by the subsidies, and CHA's
11th annual report reveals that "revenues received for carrying
the mail (over 39 million letters), together with governmental payments for CHA's role in developing scheduled mail and passenger
service by helicopter, totalled $1,786,726." This works out at
around £638,000 (appreciably less than the cost of one Victor),
including the mail payments, and can hardly be considered
excessive.
Of course, CHA has one big advantage over other operators.
Its executive vice-president, C. Wesley Moore, made this clear
when he stated in an interview: —
"Some people are surprised when they come to Chicago and find that
our main operation is between the airports. They seem to think we
should be flying somewhere else. They fail to realize that our biggest
potential is here. Midway is the aviation crossroad of the nation—the
world's busiest airport, with more than 1,200 aeroplane movements a
day. O'Hare is going to be the world's largest airport. Meigs Field has
more activity than any other single-runway airport in the world. The
passengers have to be moved from one airport to another and between
the airport and downtown Chicago.
"The fixed-wing airlines are not allowed to serve Midway and O'Hare
on the same flight. That not only would increase the air traffic density,
but fixed-wing planes could not get in and out of the airports as fast as
we do. They would still be preparing for take-off by the time we landed
at the next airport. One airline captain told me the airspace here is so
saturated that it would be easier for him to fly a DC-7 from Chicago to
San Francisco than from Midway Airport to O'Hare Field!"
Such air-traffic density calls for precise flying on the part of
the helicopter pilots, who have to remain within a half-mile of
their allotted course at all times, and within a quarter of a mile
in certain areas. Cruising height is restricted to 1,500ft generally