BOAC to the Caribbean
Thread Starter
Yes BOAC Caribbean trips were very very varied -as reflected by the wonderful old style timetable which listed every possible stopping point and only put times in on the days planes stopped making it quite complicated.
My very first trip (sub load) was LHR-JFK-ANU-BAR , we couldn’t get on the direct Super VC10 to BAR due headwinds limiting load. So it was JFK in late November and change to a Standard VC10 for the trip south .Cannot remembers a BDA stop but there might have been.
A year later we made the outbound direct I think on a 707 300 but returning it was back on the VC10 via ANU to JFK and a 747 home. Seemed a wonderful variety of ways to get there. A little later I did BDA direct from LHR and then via JFK and remembered for many years BOAC operated a shuttle 747 down from Kennedy to Kindley Field presumably as an add on from a LHR-JFK trip. Crew scheduling must have been a nightmare.
Going back to the Indian Ocean the previous poster who actually flew rather than flew on these routes mentions the great variations on those trips and I clearly remember a trip which I think many aspects of just could not happen today. I had to do a business trip to Seychelles and Mauritius-well yes someone had to.
VC10 from London via Cyprus –Khartoum (39c at 0500 Landing ) –Addis Ababa 90 mins south and 10c at 0730 and on to Seychelles. A few days there and turn up to go to Mauritius-board a slightly delayed 747 (iIIRC two BOAC flights a week one VC10 one 747) . Three hours later still on the ground flight is cancelled due to engine problems requiring engine . This was Monday noon and we finally depart Thursday at 2 pm. 2 weeks in Mauritius and a Kenya airways 707 to Nairobi for a couple of days and then another BA747 which is delayed about ten hours but resulted in a fascinating daytime Nairobi London flight with fabulous views . So something likes 3 and half days of delays . 3 intermediate stops two in rather odd places and 4 aircraft types as one standard and one super VC10. Flying was more civilised then for sure but the wheels really could come off badly if you ended up with a problem in these once or twice a week places. Sorry about a bit of thread drift but something of a common theme of BOAC/BA Long haul in the 70s
PB
My very first trip (sub load) was LHR-JFK-ANU-BAR , we couldn’t get on the direct Super VC10 to BAR due headwinds limiting load. So it was JFK in late November and change to a Standard VC10 for the trip south .Cannot remembers a BDA stop but there might have been.
A year later we made the outbound direct I think on a 707 300 but returning it was back on the VC10 via ANU to JFK and a 747 home. Seemed a wonderful variety of ways to get there. A little later I did BDA direct from LHR and then via JFK and remembered for many years BOAC operated a shuttle 747 down from Kennedy to Kindley Field presumably as an add on from a LHR-JFK trip. Crew scheduling must have been a nightmare.
Going back to the Indian Ocean the previous poster who actually flew rather than flew on these routes mentions the great variations on those trips and I clearly remember a trip which I think many aspects of just could not happen today. I had to do a business trip to Seychelles and Mauritius-well yes someone had to.
VC10 from London via Cyprus –Khartoum (39c at 0500 Landing ) –Addis Ababa 90 mins south and 10c at 0730 and on to Seychelles. A few days there and turn up to go to Mauritius-board a slightly delayed 747 (iIIRC two BOAC flights a week one VC10 one 747) . Three hours later still on the ground flight is cancelled due to engine problems requiring engine . This was Monday noon and we finally depart Thursday at 2 pm. 2 weeks in Mauritius and a Kenya airways 707 to Nairobi for a couple of days and then another BA747 which is delayed about ten hours but resulted in a fascinating daytime Nairobi London flight with fabulous views . So something likes 3 and half days of delays . 3 intermediate stops two in rather odd places and 4 aircraft types as one standard and one super VC10. Flying was more civilised then for sure but the wheels really could come off badly if you ended up with a problem in these once or twice a week places. Sorry about a bit of thread drift but something of a common theme of BOAC/BA Long haul in the 70s
PB
Ah, the joys of the early JT9Ds. They even needed to have a standby aircraft at JFK for the inaugural, first ever 747 flight, by Pan Am - and it had to be used !
