1961 - Lydd to Ostend in the Bristol Frightener

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CharlieOneSix
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1961 - Lydd to Ostend in the Bristol Frightener

#1 Post by CharlieOneSix » Mon Mar 16, 2020 1:45 pm

The helicopter pilots' mantra: If it hasn't gone wrong then it's just about to...
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Re: 1961 - Lydd to Ostend in the Bristol Frightener

#2 Post by Pontius Navigator » Mon Mar 16, 2020 1:52 pm

They used to do Speke to Ronaldsway in the 50, and a regular Rapide service too.

In the 50s our parents, if they had a car, struggled to put in a gallon of two of petrol and you could only imagine the wealth of those that could fly their cars away too.

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Re: 1961 - Lydd to Ostend in the Bristol Frightener

#3 Post by G-CPTN » Mon Mar 16, 2020 2:13 pm

When we went to East Germany in 1990, an Ossie asked whether we had come on an airplane with our car - which seemed ridiculous in 1990 - yet 30 years earlier it could have been considered possible.

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Re: 1961 - Lydd to Ostend in the Bristol Frightener

#4 Post by Capetonian » Mon Mar 16, 2020 2:29 pm

I worked in a very small skiing village in Switzerland for a season. I had a GB registered car and I don't think the local peasantry had ever seen a non-CH registered car before, so it stood out.
One of the village folk asked me one day where the car came from, and I explained. About 10 minutes later the penny dropped that the UK is an island, and he wheezed back up the hill to ask me how I got the car across the sea.
"On a boat" I explained.
Looking puzzled, he exclaimed : "It must be a very big boat."

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Re: 1961 - Lydd to Ostend in the Bristol Frightener

#5 Post by Boac » Mon Mar 16, 2020 2:37 pm

In the interests of lightening the mood and in memoriam for the recently departed, this is my sort of Bristol Freighter
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Re: 1961 - Lydd to Ostend in the Bristol Frightener

#6 Post by ian16th » Mon Mar 16, 2020 2:57 pm

The RAF had 1 (one) Bristol Frightener, it was at Boscombe.

The story I heard was that they took it to evaluate for the RAF, and decided that we didn't want them.

Boscombe kept it and used it to ferry engines back & forth from hot weather trials.

I refuelled it a few times as it passed through Istres/Orange. It had funny fuel caps that didn't need a screwdriver to open & close. But if you stood on a closed one, it was liable to flip open.
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Re: 1961 - Lydd to Ostend in the Bristol Frightener

#7 Post by om15 » Mon Mar 16, 2020 3:23 pm

The last two remaining Bristol Freighters in the UK operated up to the mid 80s carrying horses, the aircraft were maintained by Westcountry Aircraft Services at Exeter, they smelt very strongly of horse pee.
The Frogs used a couple to fly their M24 Chaffre tanks into Dien Bien Phu as there was no other suitable aircraft available.
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1954 Air Vietnam Bristol Freighter F-VNAK landing at Dien Bien Phu, Vietnam, Apr 1954

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Re: 1961 - Lydd to Ostend in the Bristol Frightener

#8 Post by llondel » Mon Mar 16, 2020 3:31 pm

Did they secure the cars or were they just driven in and parked?

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Re: 1961 - Lydd to Ostend in the Bristol Frightener

#9 Post by G-CPTN » Mon Mar 16, 2020 3:37 pm

llondel wrote:
Mon Mar 16, 2020 3:31 pm
Did they secure the cars or were they just driven in and parked?
I presume that, like car ferries, there were basic tie-down points.

I don't think the Bristol 170 was approved for aerobatics.

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Re: 1961 - Lydd to Ostend in the Bristol Frightener

#10 Post by CharlieOneSix » Mon Mar 16, 2020 4:30 pm

Silver City operated the Bristol 170 on its Hurn-Cherbourg route in the very early 60's and they used to drone over our house in Bournemouth. Drifting my own thread now......One of their Captains was John Pothecary who owned the beautiful Robinson Redwing G-ABNX and Comper Swift G-ABUU. He kept them in the hangar at 622 Gliding School at Christchurch airfield where I was a Staff Cadet after my gliding course in '62. Many are the times I've pushed those two aircraft in and out of the hangar for him. The Redwing - with folding wings - had its original Genet engine whilst the Swift had a Pobjoy Cataract engine.

Here's the Redwing airborne in a childrens TV episode. From 7:24 to the end of the clip...
.

and the Swift...but it was painted blue in my time...
.
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Re: 1961 - Lydd to Ostend in the Bristol Frightener

#11 Post by Boac » Mon Mar 16, 2020 5:00 pm


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Re: 1961 - Lydd to Ostend in the Bristol Frightener

#12 Post by Pontius Navigator » Mon Mar 16, 2020 8:19 pm

The other car ferry was the Carvair. Amazing that that was the future but obviously a very expensive one.

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Re: 1961 - Lydd to Ostend in the Bristol Frightener

#13 Post by ian16th » Mon Mar 16, 2020 9:14 pm

When were Hovercraft introduced?

I used a Hovercraft just the once, about 1972. Can't be accurate about the date.
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Re: 1961 - Lydd to Ostend in the Bristol Frightener

#14 Post by G-CPTN » Mon Mar 16, 2020 9:19 pm

ian16th wrote:
Mon Mar 16, 2020 9:14 pm
When were Hovercraft introduced?
In 1966, two cross-channel passenger hovercraft services were inaugurated using SR.N6 hovercraft.
Hoverlloyd ran services from Ramsgate Harbour, England, to Calais, France, and Townsend Ferries also started a service to Calais from Dover, which was soon superseded by that of Seaspeed.
Seaspeed opted to procure large SR.N4s to launch its cross-Channel ferry service; the first of these hoverferries was introduced in 1968.
finally withdrawing hovercraft services in 2000

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Re: 1961 - Lydd to Ostend in the Bristol Frightener

#15 Post by ian16th » Mon Mar 16, 2020 9:28 pm

Surely the Hovercraft killed off the car air ferry business then?

As I said I only used the Hovercraft the once. The reduction in the cross channel journey time could be neutralised simply by using a ship and having a meal while you were on it.

If you took the Hovercraft, you still had to eat and you stopped for an hour to eat it!

I had a similar experience using North Sea Ferries, Hull - Rotterdam, the overnight journey was effectively reduced by your kipping time, because you were going to sleep somewhere!
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Re: 1961 - Lydd to Ostend in the Bristol Frightener

#16 Post by G-CPTN » Mon Mar 16, 2020 9:43 pm

With regard to cross-Channel hovercraft, I travelled from the Continent about 1985.
Having boarded and moved from the car deck up to the passenger cabin, I jokingly said to the 'stewardess' "Can we go up on deck?" - to which she replied "I'll just check" before returning and saying "Come with me . . ." and I was shown up to the flight deck/cockpit!
I chatted with the pilot throughout the trip who was keen to chat - he said that he was "neither fish nor fowl - or maybe both" as he had to both sail and fly the machine and had to observe both sets of controls.
The 'view' from the cockpit was clear from the spray that surrounded the rest of the vessel, and it was (for me) another one of life's unexpected experiences.

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Re: 1961 - Lydd to Ostend in the Bristol Frightener

#17 Post by Ibbie » Tue Mar 17, 2020 4:43 pm


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