Originally Posted by
ATNotts
I'm not quite sure on the time line, but if my memory serves me correctly, towards the end of the "British Air Services" operation that was Northeast and Cambrian didn't the BA bean (pardon the pun) counters, possibly in collusion with the marketing department split up the regional operations of BEA into "Channel Islands Division" based nominally at BHX, and "Scottish Division". The Channel Islands and Scottish fleets were V.802s with Northeast and Cambrian being allocated V.806 variants. Is the "Channel" being referred to the BEA Channel Islands operation perhaps, rather than Channel Airways? Again my rusty memory recalls that the BEA Channel Islands operation used the callsign "Bealine" at least to begin with, though later on BHX service flew under the IATA prefix "BZ" with callsign "Albion".
I can't readily think of which airframe "Yankee Delta" would have been, it certainly doesn't show on any of the BEA, Northeast or Cambrian fleet lists that I can find.
The BZ IATA prefix and call sign Albion were used by BA's Regional Division from around 1977.
With the merger of the Northeast, Cambrian and Channel/Scottish operations in April 1976 the practice seemed to be Bealine for domestic flights and Speedbird for international sectors with four digit flight numbers. However by the summer of 76 aircraft operating from Leeds had reverted to NS/Northeast and three digit callsigns. One suspects a possible overload of similar callsigns either on Airways or in the London TMA.
Was BZ/Albion used before c1977?