Lands End & St Marys airports
Lands End (St Just) airport came about as a direct result of the attempts to start a service to the isles.
Originally the golf course on St Marys was utilised and the aircraft were the DH Dragon. In fact they were well suited to the job as they required very little space to operate and with folding outer wings could be accommodated in a suitable shed at St Just. When BEA operated the route they had a fleet of Rapides up until the time the S61 Helicopter service started. It has to be said that the S61 really got Scillies into the serious tourist business as it was far less weather dependant operating from its base at Penzance, and could carry up to 30pax at a time. However Lands End (owned at the time by a consortium of Councils) carried on and that's when Brian Neely started its second coming with improvements and flying promotion. It was a fabulous airfield to visit and eventually Viv Bellamy took on the challenge and a flying club blossomed. Westward airways also built replica aircraft which helped to keep the operation going through the winter months. The current owners/operators (Isle of Scilly Steamship Co) were encouraged to get involved as a direct result of a docks strike that saw their normal business stopped by industrial action. A Cessna 337, and later an Islander were pressed into service to fly food and goods to the Isles and the company decided to start their very own Airline which has grown to operate a mixed fleet of Islander/Twin Otter from the 'modernised' Lands End plus NQY airports.