What's with 'Chatham Historic Dockyard'?
 

I flew back from JFK yesterday on 'G-TECH', and mistakenly thought it was the only aircraft named 'Chatham Historic Dockyard'. After I did a search on Airliners.net, I discovered that the name is applied right across the BA fleet... 737s, 747s, 757s, 767s, 777s!!!

What's that all about then? I guess it's linked to the livery, but I'd be interested to hear the story behind it. Saw a small plaque on the aircraft, but didn't get a chance to have a read.

Finally, one of the crew told me they were going to overhaul the interiors of the 767s later in the year - long overdue, as it's like crossing the pond in a skip full of crap TVs!

It's a legacy of Robert Ayling's wacky tails. There were many different designs based on art from around the world. They all carried appropriate titles such as "Whale Rider" or whatever. "Chatham" was the design applied to Concorde.

When it was suggested to Ayling (by Maggie T among others) that he'd screwed up rather badly, the Chatham design was progressively applied to the rest of the fleet as they underwent routine repaints. There are only one or two aircraft remaining in the old livery now and the "Chatham" aircraft no longer carry the title, except on the plaque inside the main door.

I believe the design comes from a Naval flag (during the times of Nelson?) which was flown from ships departing Chatham Naval dockyard

...or summat like that :confused:

Fried Chicken

Union Flag -- a version of the British Union Flag, designed by the Historic Dockyard, Chatham, United Kingdom.

IMHO the chatham colours are very nice. I liked the Landor livery but do prefer the current one...

Loads must be poor if BA are using a Rockwell Commander 114
on the JFK route!

The state of the 767, I'm surprised it wasn't in BOAC colours!

There's no doubt that the 'Chatham' livery looks the part, but sticking the same name on each a/c is just typical of a big, stupid business!!!

Who says you need common sense to succeed? :}

It's not the name of the aircraft, it's the name of the design. That's not so stupid when there are numerous different designs hailing from different countries. And now that there aren't, it's coming off.