History of long-haul flying from MAN

[EZYA319]

Hi folks,

I'm wiring an article for a well know aviation magazine looking at the history of long-haul flying from Manchester Airport and how it has helped shaped the facility and I'm after some help if possible.

Just wondering if any one has any tidbits of information for me - airlines, routes, aircraft types, start dates of routes etc etc of if any one could point me in the right direction of where I may discover such information.

Any help would be much appreciated.

Thanks in advance.

[tubby linton]

Monarch in 1993 were doing a lot of flights every week to Orlando as part of the Hoover contract.

[rog747]

I can say that a large number of Affinity & ABC charter flights to the USA & Canada were very busy at MAN from the 1960's - Caledonian, BMA, Dan Air, Wardair, CP Air, with 707 and DC-8's at first, followed by Laker Skytrain with 707 and DC-10's.
Air Florida DC-10's made an appearance in the 1980's, followed with flights to Orlando with many charter airlines flying in there from around 1988...
Virgin Atlantic joined the Orlando foray in the 1990's.

Previous long haul was with BOAC in the main again across the pond starting from the prop days in the 1950's onward to BA 747 days...
Pan Am was a regular with 707's.

Later on saw Qantas SAA SQ and PIA entering and/or dabbling into MAN with 747's to their home-lands.

[RetiredBA/BY]

Flew MAN -PIK - JFK and YYZ with BA as a VC10 F/0.
Later MAN -MCO as BY 767 captain.

[c52]

May be a false memory, but IIRC the first SVC-10 to New York was on a snowy April 1st with a bitter east wind that kept me indoors. It made a nice noise, though.

[renfrew]

There is a PPRuNe thread re BOAC using Burtonwood in the mid 1950's which might be of interest.
See BOAC at Ringway/Burtonwood.

[Brewster Buffalo]

R A Scholefield's "Manchester Airport" has the first scheduled service to New York. via Gander, starting on 28 October 1953 by Sabena using DC-6B OO-CBH.
BOAC's service Heathrow-Manchester-Prestwick-New York started on 7 May 1954 with Stratocruiser G-ALSC.

[Mr Mac]

EZYA319
I travelled to Barbados via Prestwick as a young boy on a BOAC VC10 around early 70,s, which was my first LH trip from Manchester. Other LH trips from there in the 90,s with carriers who are no longer there included KL with Malaysian, Joburg v Paris (I think, it was awhile ago !) with SAA, all the other LH carriers I use are still operating there.
Cheers
Mr Mac

[EZYA319]

Thanks everyone for your replies so far! Really appreciated.

[Tim Zukas]

In 1952 the longest flight out of Manchester was Swissair's DC-3 to Zurich. Ringway's runway 6 was extended from 4200 feet to 5900 feet in 1950, allowing four-eng airliners, but looks like they didn't appear until Sabena in 1953. Sabena and BOAC DC-7Cs flew to NY in 1957 -- in summer 1958 SN's flight was scheduled 12 hr 25 min MAN to IDL, so maybe it was nonstop. (SN also had 1049Hs Manchester to NY in summer 1958, the year of the Brussels fair. Apparently not nonstop -- schedule was 15 hr 10 min.)

The Aeroplane for 16 Dec 1960 says BOAC 707s started on 16 October; runway 6 was then 7000 feet. The November 1960 OAG says four BOAC 707s a week LHR-MAN-PIK-BOS-IDL, two BOAC Britannias LHR-MAN-PIK-IDL, and two Sabena 707s MAN-SNN-IDL; it doesn't show a stop at SNN on the eastward SN flight.

The 12/63 OAG shows one SN 707 a week MAN to IDL in 7 hr 50 min -- so probably nonstop? MAN's runway was then ... 7500 feet?

No one ever scheduled a B377 out of Ringway, did they?

[Musket90]

I remember mid-late 60's BOAC operated MAN-PIK-JFK with VC10/SuperVC10 westbound Speedbird BA537 and also to Canada, I think Montreal, via PIK with B707 Speedbird BA607.

[Groundloop]

I remember mid-late 60's BOAC operated MAN-PIK-JFK with VC10/SuperVC10 westbound Speedbird BA537 and also to Canada, I think Montreal, via PIK with B707 Speedbird BA607.

My memories of PIK around that time was the BA537 was the VC-10/Super VC-10 from MAN to JFK but that the 707 flight was BA637 to Montreal and Toronto. I always wondered how both flights ended in 37.