Clipper, Vol. 17, No. 6, Mid-summer 1958

              ATLANTIC DIVISION
Volume 17
Proving Flights:
Clippers Move Into New Home
Maintenance has made its move. In a two-week series of carefully planned and precisely executed maneuvers, all IDL maintenance and aircraft servicing facilities made the two-mile trek across the field. They were installed in our new $15,000,000 hangar without interfering with normal flight operations.
Jets Will Fly Cargo to SJU
Pan American World Airways plans to gain jet flight and ground handling experience by utilizing the first of its new 575-mile-an-hour Boeing 707 Clippers as a cargo carrier to Latin America prior to placing it in transatlantic passenger service this fall.
President Juan T. Trippe said government authorization for the jet cargo service has been requested and is being actively considered by the Civil Aeronautics Board. If approved, the new jets will have the highest flight-time background of any transport aircraft ever to enter scheduled passenger service.
Pan American anticipates inaugurating transatlantic jet passenger service late this year,
Mr. Trippe told stockholders at the company’s 30th annual meeting in New York City.
Mr. Trippe reported that the first three Boeing 707 Clippers of Pan American’s new $300,-000,000 jet fleet are now undergoing Civil Aeronautics Admin-
ACTRESS Janet Blair busily phones friends from IDL after returning from an eight-month run of “The Bells Are Ringing” in London and is enroute to the West Coast for the start of a television series.
istration certification flight tests.
The aircraft already have accumulated over 300 hours of flight time in addition to the 1,000 hours flown by the prototype of the 707.
Preliminary observations indicate that the required specifications for CAA certification of the Boeing 707 have been met and probably exceeded, Mr. Trippe said.
He said that Gen. Charles A. Lindbergh, technical consultant for Pan American, and many company pilots have flown the Boeing 707.
“These well-qualified pilots are unanimously enthusiastic in their report of the excellent flying characteristics of the plane. They state that it is far superior aerodynamically to any of the many transports introduced by Pan American in its 30-year history. For example, the landing speed of 105 knots is as low as that of existing piston-engined aircraft,” Mr. Trippe said.
Tests for cabin vibration and noise levels gained for the new jet the rating of “excellent.”
Jet delivery dates appear to be ahead of schedule, Mr. Trippe said. The company is proceeding rapidly with its plans for integrating the jet Clippers into the piston-engined fleet as well as for pilot training and ground handling of the new planes. Senior pilots without exception are exercising their rights to bid for the privilege of flying the jet Clippers.
At a cruising speed of 575 miles an hour, transatlantic jet Clipper flights will be scheduled for less than seven hours, some five hours under the time required for the fastest piston-engined airliners, Mr. Trippe said.
Mr. Trippe also said that Pan American’s new $8,000,000 passenger terminal at Idlewild is scheduled for completion by March, 1959.
Pan American is scheduling a record 170 transatlantic flights each week this summer — an increase of 16 over last year.
Mr. Trippe said test firings are being stepped up by the military services at the Missile Test Center at Cape Canaveral, Florida, which Pan American operates as prime contractor to the U. S. Air Force. The facility also includes sea-going observation vessels and a chain of island tracking stations extending 5,000 miles into the South Atlantic. Pan American is responsible for maintenance, plan-(Continued on page 9)
With P. Vilkus at controls, the last Clipper to migrate across IDL is thumbed in by J. Sena.
MID-SUMMER ISSUE 1958
Ait Editorial...
We're Just Beginning!
If you still think that what you did yesterday was big, you have been loafing today! There's a statement that can take a little reflective thinking. This business of ours has so many great new challenges to be met that just scrambling over today's problems makes yesterday's look smaller. That's part of what makes this business fascinating.
And there are plenty of challenges ahead. A few years ago, it was popular to say ''the romance is gone from aviation." Don't believe it. Whether "romance" means the heady inspiration of bright new successes, or the exasperations of the rougher days, plenty of both are right on the horizon.
We have recently discussed editorially our tendency to be so preoccupied with correcting the things we do less than perfectly that we begin to think that we don't do anything as well as the other guy does. We have here noted that we actually do most things a darn sight better than our competitors do. We excel in aircraft utilization, in on-time performance, in regular delivery of a superior product. We devoted a column to pointing out that in our direct contact with the customer, in the refinements of passenger service, we have no equal.
The same superlatives can and should be applied to the rest of the operation. Everyone knows we have the best Flight Crews in the business. They fly the best equipment that money can buy. The best caliber of maintenance is given that equipment by the best technical and mechanical crews in the industry. Others copy our scheduling methods, follow our lead in stock-keeping and control, materials and work planning, reservations, and accounting.
But being "best" is a relative thing. We all know we aren't perfect. And the standard of comparison keeps improving all the time. As we improve, so does the industry. In fact, things move so fast in this industry that you have to run fast to keep from being run over from behind.
Fortunately, this year provides us with an unparalleled opportunity to get a long way ahead. Our Division will soon introduce to the world the American commercial ¡et era. We must do this job better than anyone else could do it. This will be a "showcase" operation from the beginning. Everyone, industry and government, traveling and non-traveling public, at home and abroad, will be watching us.
To do less than the best would be to do ourselves and the whole industry a serious disservice. As President Trippe has recently said, if we do this one job the way we should, the competition won't catch up with us for a decade. This job is big enough to make yesterday's challenges seem small. To meet it, we need an enduring confidence in our own abilities. We have earned that kind of confidence. Let's use it.
— RICHARD ADAMS
The big move got under way over the weekend of June 14-15, when the bulk of the office equipment was transported to the new Hangar. On the morning of June 16, office personnel reported for work at the new building.
During the remainder of the week, Hangar 14 was in a constant state of excitement as electrical outlets, power supplies, wiring, etc. were made ready for the arrival of maintenance and its array of equipment.
Then the move of some 150 tons of spare parts and supplies, engines, propellors, shop tools, work stands, and rolling stock was started. In all, some 550 truckloads of equipment were shifted across the field.
Now the stage was set for the big day — arrival of aircraft at the new Hangar. On the eve-(Continued on page 5)
Company Pays 55 th Dividend
At a meeting on July 1, Directors of Pan American World Airways, Inc. declared a dividend of 20 cents per share payable August 15, 1958 to stockholders of record at the close of business on July 25, 1958.
This is the fifty-fifth dividend paid by Pan American. Payments of 20 cents a share were made on February 14 and May 16, 1958. Dividend payments have been made each year since 1941.