London - Perth, March 1974

[Alchad]

OK,

Part of me says this is an almost impossible question and part of me says that with the web, anything is possible, let's see...

I'm writing a potted life history for the grand children and want to mention a flight I took to Perth, WA in March 1974. All I rememebr is that I flew from Heathrow (obviously) and stopped several times in Europe before another stop in Bombay and then Singapore before the final leg to Perth

According to my old passport I arrived on the 11th March 1974 which was a Monday. I know I didn't fly BOAC or Qantas and for some reason I think it could have been Sabena, but I'm not absolutely certain of that.

Could anyone help me in narrowing out which possible carriers it could have been?

Many thanks.

[The SSK]

If it was one single direct flight it can only have been BA or Qantas. Otherwise you must have changed somewhere, or conceivably Singapore Airlines with the same aircraft and a change of flight number in SIN. Quite a few European airlines flew to Australia in those days (but definitely not Sabena) but few if any of them served Perth. If anyone did, Lufthansa would be the most likely.

Dunno about everything being on the web, my office has a cellar-ful of old ABC schedule guides, we should have one for Winter 73-4, I'll see if I can dig it out.

[vctenderness]

Dunno about everything being on the web, my office has a cellar-ful of old ABC schedule guides, we should have one for Winter 73-4, I'll see if I can dig it out.
Blimey! A cellar full of old ABC guides your missus must be in a state of constant excitement!

[Alchad]

The SSK,

That would be very kind of you, I had thought of the ABC guides, but couldn't imagine one from 19794 would still be in existance!

It was definately a direct flight from London to Singapore, but could well have been a change at Singapore. As I said there were probably at least 3 stops on route, one of which was definately Bombay, if i had to guess at the other two, Vienna and Tehran could be possibliites. My passport is stamped 11 March 1974, so I must have left heathrow on the 9th?

Alan C

[EGBE0523]

I think you were on a QF service as I can remember coming back with them, via SIN BOM THR VIE and should have then gone on to LHR but we picked up some tech fault out of VIE and diverted to AMS before eventually getting into LHR

[WHBM]

If you know you didn't fly BOAC or Qantas, and routed through Singapore, and didn't change carriers, then the only other contender would be Singapore Airlines.

Can't lay my hands on one of their 1974 timetables, but have got a link to one from two years later, 1976.

http://www.timetableimages.com/ttimages/sq/sq76/sq76-3.jpg

Slight challenge is that the 4 times weekly service from Singapore to Perth didn't arrive on a Monday then, but this is the sort of thing that changes from year to year. In fact a flight does arrive very early on Tuesday morning at 0135, so if the officer on late shift didn't change their date stamp at midnight ....

The connection with this flight, assuming you didn't stop over, left London Heathrow at 1530 on Saturday, and the 747 routed through Paris, Athens, Bahrain and Bombay. These intermediate points did vary somewhat from year to year, but I think this gives a bit of a guide.

Blimey! A cellar full of old ABC guides your missus must be in a state of constant excitement!My old ABCs (alas not a 1974 one) are in the attic, as we don't have a cellar. Mrs WHBM :) to whom I showed this comment burst out laughing !

[David Eyre]

Hi Alchad,

In March 1974, these were the only international carriers operating scheduled services to Perth:


Qantas
BOAC
Air India
Singapore Airlines
Cathay Pacific
South African Airways


The route flown via Bombay and Singapore rules out Cathay and SAA, so it would have to be one of the others.


Regards,
David

[Alchad]

All,

Thanks very much for taking the time to reply to my query. I'm constantly surprised at the helpfullness of complete strangers on Forums such as this, take a bow!

If it helps those of you with old ABC's in their cellars or attics, Take a look at the price they fetch ( or perhaps more correctly, are offered for) on EBay. Your wives may benefit from your wise investments!

Alan C

[HEATHROW DIRECTOR]

You said it was a "direct" flight but that you stopped several times in Europe.. Perhaps several carriers were involved?

[The SSK]

Well. I found the tripartite BA/QF/SQ timetable for Winter 73/4 and needless to say, there is no straightforward answer.

There are two Monday arrivals in Perth. One is BA724 which left LHR at 16:45 on Sunday and transited Frankfurt, Bahrain and SIN before arriving PER at 22:55

The other was QF740 which left LHR at 17:30 on Saturday and transited FRA and BAH on the way to SIN. This connected with QF726 which arrived PER at 02:40 on Monday. This involved switching between a 747 and a 707.

The only Vienna call in the pattern would not have fitted – it was on a Qantas Monday departure from LHR. Tehran would not have fitted either, although QF stopped there most days these flights did not serve SIN, they used Bangkok or Kuala Lumpur instead.

Which leaves Bombay … as far as the Kangaroo Route was concerned, this was served only by Singapore Airlines, on their Monday and Friday departures from LHR. The Friday flight (dep 16:00) transited AMS, FRA, BAH and BOM arriving SIN late Saturday evening – but still early enough to catch the QF726 to arrive in PER on a Sunday. So the only way that would fit would be if you made a 26 hour stopover in SIN and caught the following day’s QF726 (as above). This would have been a 707 throughout.

Over to you …

The SSK

P.S. I said that the ABCs were in the cellar of my office, where they are archived for eventual research purposes. My wife is blissfully ignorant of their existence and my office is no doubt blissfully unaware of their value - there's more than 50 years' worth.

[thrubwell]

i flew to perth from Singapore several times in the early 70s either to perth or enroute to Fiji. I always flew Air India.
i also flew from LHR to Singapore a number of times on BA but never remember going via Bombay but delhi and calcutta . Whereas Air India obviously routed through Bombay.

[Cremeegg]

For what it's worth I flew LHR - BOM - PER - MEL - AKL with BA in summer 1978. It was then a relatively new service with B747-200's with RR engines that had the legs to do BOM direct from LHR and similarly BOM - PER direct. Previously BA using B747's with P&W engines had to stop in the Gulf on the way to BOM. LHR - SIN non stop was still a dream until the 747-400 came along.

From memory QF had yet to have anything with the same range apart from the 747SP which I think at that time they were only using across the Pacific.