Originally Posted by
pax britanica
. . . the ill fated Papa India would have crossed Epsom as its first waypoint out of LHR on what in those days I think was a simple Dover One departure, I think the first SIDs were in use by then. Earlier than that one could listen to LHR departure controllers issuing the whole Instrument departure for each aircraft which was usually something like cleared IMC to XXX cross Epsom above two (thousand) Biggin above four and something along the lines of climb as directed by radar . . .
Prior to the introduction of SIDs outbound routes from LHR were as shown here. SIDs therefore must have appeared sometime after May 1969. The Dover 1 SID from 28L/R followed the route shown here (possibly omitting BIG), then DET - DVR.
