Roy McDougall died on the 9th September 2002 aged 80.
Roy was one of the founder members of Britannia, having joined the Company on the 1st April 1962 as Deputy Chief Pilot. As the Airline expanded Roy became Operations Director in 1977 and held that post until his retirement from flying in 1981. He then became Ground Operations Director until he finally retired in 1986.
Malcolm/Mac
22nd Sep 2002, 05:04
Roy Lawson Heriot McDougall, DFC
Born 16 September, 1921, in Salisbury, Southern Rhodesia, he joined the SRAF and learned to fly on the Avro 504k and then the Harvard. Like so many young men from his era, from all over the world, he came to England and flew in the RAF, mostly in Bomber Command. Amongst other things he flew a Hampden from North Luffenham on the famous St. Nazaire Raid. Later, he flew many B-24 Liberator missions over Burma, from Digri Base, near Calcutta. He was awarded the DFC during his war service.
At the end of the war he had the choice of Command of 44 ( Rhodesia ) Squadron or to join a small band of multi-prop chaps in the hairy blue to be seconded to the fledgling BOAC. In the days before "crew duty times" he operated 13 hours sectors on Lancastrians & Yorks, from Hurn through a small place called Heathrow. He knew Jimmy James then and was himself BALPA PLC Chairman for Hurn at that time. He later converted to the Hermes Fleet.
Leaving BOAC in the 1954, he worked in Frankfurt, as a training captain and later Chief Pilot / Ops Manager, for LTU; his introduction to management.
In 1960 he worked for a couple of seasons freelance, mainly for Dan-Air, but also other unusual jobs around Africa, flying Vikings and Hermes, before joining Euravia, a newly formed company, that originally ran Skyways of London in parallel, as Deputy Chief Pilot, operating Constellations. As the better-informed will now guess, when the airline upgraded their fleet to the Bristol Britannia, they decided on a grand new name . . . Britannia Airways! This is today probably the largest Independent operator in the world and he was very proud to have been a founder member. While at Britannia, he received the Queens Award to Industry for his Committee work in setting up the Luton Air Traffic Control Zone. He eventually joined the Board of Britannia, as Operations Director and was still flying once a week on the Boeing 737, to keep in touch with line flying when he retired in 1985. He was also delighted to be at the controls just once of Britannia Airway's new B-767; the future world workhorse.
He played a lot of golf during his retirement in Bournemouth for nine years, wintering in South Africa, before resuming his South African citizenship and finally moving to Capetown, where golf, bridge and the love, support and companionship of Antoinette kept him happy and active for his remaining eight years. In his seventies, he faced new technology undeterred in the form of the PC. Many men younger than him have fought shy of that one! The result was an avalanche of E-mail correspondence with family and many old colleagues all over the world.
Aviation is a very different arena today, but he and many of his generation laid the groundwork to what we enjoy today. He died on the 9th September, 2002. He survived his first two wives and brother, Ian a year his junior and leaves a daughter and a son
Malcolm McDougall
[ Ex-Bristows, British Airways Helicopters and British International Helicopters ]