November 1952 to March 1957
British European Airways Corporation (BEA)
G-ALWE - c/n 4 - a V.701 series Viscount
United Kingdom registered
17 November 1952
Registered to British European Airways Corporation (BEA), Keyline House, Ruislip, Middlesex.
21 November 1952
Airworthiness Approval Note (AAN) (No.1455) issued a Certificate of Airworthiness (CofA) allowing a maximum take-off weight of 56,000 lbs which was later increased to 57,000 lbs.
3 January 1953
Delivered to British European Airways (BEA) as their first Type 701 Viscount, as yet un-named.
It now had the 'Slatted' type Direct Vision (DV) cockpit windows fitted and a modified cheatline profile at the forward end.
It departed from Wisley Airfield, Surrey, England to London Airport (Heathrow), Middlesex, England.
It was fitted with Rolls-Royce Dart RDa3 Mark 505 engines. Serial numbers: 1001 & 1002 on the port side and 1003 & 1013 on the starboard side.
The cabin was originally fitted out with 40 seats in a four-abreast (2 + 2) all-first class interior, but it was re-configured as a 47 seat all-tourist class layout before it entered service.
 Viscount illustrations by David Carter
22 January 1953
Operated the first Viscount service from London Airport (Heathrow), Middlesex, England to Köln Airport, West Germany in 70 minutes at an average speed of 282.9 mph.
It returned to London, England in 75 minutes at an average speed of 262 mph.
11 February 1953
Named as 'R M A Discovery' by Lady Douglas of Kirtleside during a ceremony at Wisley Airfield, Surrey, England and was then flown back to London Airport in 6 minutes.
19 March 1953
Operated the first Viscount service from London Airport (Heathrow), Middlesex, England to Kloten Airport, Zurich, Switzerland in 107 minutes at an average speed of 274.44 mph.
20 March 1953
Operated the first Viscount service from London Airport (Heathrow), Middlesex, England to Speke Airport, Liverpool, England.
20 March 1953
Ferried to Wisley Airfield, Surrey, England for modification work with Vickers.
16 April 1953
Returned to British European Airways (BEA) at London Airport (Heathrow), Middlesex, England.
19 April 1953
Operated the first Viscount service from London Airport (Heathow), Middlesex, England to Ciampino Airport, Rome, Italy, Ellinikon Airport, Athens, Greece and Yesilkoy Airport, Istanbul, Turkey flown by Captain E A Turner.
1953
BRITISH PATHE FILM ARCHIVE
BEA G-ALWF (C/N 5) arriving at Rome, Italy and G-ALWE departing.
Click to see film
5 June 1953
Ferried to Wisley Airfield, Surrey, England for modification work with Vickers.
20 June 1953
Returned to British European Airways (BEA) at London Airport (Heathrow), Middlesex, England.
1 July 1953
Operated the first Viscount service from London Airport (Heathrow), Middlesex, England to Kastrup Airport, Copenhagen, Denmark in 176 minutes at an average speed of 249.8 mph and on to Arlanda Airport, Stockholm, Sweden. Flown by Captains A S Johnson and J Affleck.
1954 to 1962
The original ‘cutlass’ design propeller blades were gradually replaced by new symmetrical ‘needle’ blade propeller sets.
From photographic evidence, both propeller types were fitted to Rolls-Royce Dart RDa3, Mark 505 and Mark 506 engines and many Type 701 aircraft flew with an ‘intermix’ of both types of propeller blades.
7 April 1954
First noted at Blackbushe Airport, Hampshire, England.
29 April 1954
Ferried to Hurn Airport, Hampshire, England for modification work with Vickers.
11 May 1954
Returned to British European Airways (BEA) at London Airport (Heathrow), Middlesex, England.
4 March 1955
Ferried to Teversham Airport, Cambridge, England for modification work with Marshall's.
31 March 1955
Returned to British European Airways (BEA) at London Airport (Heathrow), Middlesex, England.
20 April 1955
Operated the first Viscount service from London Airport (Heathrow), Middlesex, England to Reim Airport, Munich, West Germany and Ellinikon Airport, Athens, Greece flown by Captain Crawford.
May 1955 to December 1956
All BEA V.701 aircraft were gradually retrofitted with Rolls-Royce Dart RDa3 Mark 506 engines in place of the original Mk.505 engines. Aircraft are known to have flown with an ‘intermix’ of both engine marks between these dates.
When completely retro-fitted with Mark 506 engines, the V.701A designation was applied to these aircraft although this has not been seen widely used or quoted.
5 December 1955
Ferried to Teversham Airport, Cambridge, England for modification work with Marshall's.
11 February 1956
Returned to British European Airways (BEA) at London Airport (Heathrow), Middlesex, England.
31 March 1956
The BEA Annual Report stated that the Viscount fleet had achieved an annual profit for the previous year of £1,138,605 ($3.18 million dolars) and that each individual Viscount had achieved an average profit of £43,292 ($121,217), which works out as a profit of £24.3.0 ($68.00) per flying hour or 2 shillings (28 cents) per route mile.
5 May 1956
Last noted at Blackbushe Airport, Hampshire, England.
15 August 1956
A letter was written to Trans-Canada Air Lines (TCA) by Vickers-Armstrongs (Aircraft) Ltd stating that they were in discussion with British European Airways (BEA) about the scheduled replacement of the inner plane lower spar booms on G-ALWE.
TCA were invited to send engineering representatives to the UK to observe this work, ahead of performing the same task on their own aircraft.
A date of 23 October 1956 was proposed for this work to commence at a Vickers facility but it is not yet confirmed whether this work actually took place before the aircraft crashed.
9 October 1956
Noted at Prestwick Airport, Ayrshire, Scotland.
The crash scene
15 March 1957
14 March 1957
Crashed onto a council estate in Shadowmoss Road, Wythenshawe, a southern district of Manchester on final approach to Ringway Airport, Manchester, England at 13:46 local time.
After a Ground Control Approach (GCA) to Ringway Airport, Manchester, England, flight 411 from Schiphol Airport, Amsterdam, Netherlands it broke through the clouds and continued for a visual approach. One report states that the flight originated from Rotterdam. Details please to information@vickersviscount.net
The approach was uneventful until about 1 mile short of the runway when the aircraft was seen to enter a shallow descending turn to the right with a steepening bank angle. The starboard wingtip eventually touched the ground causing the aircraft to crash inverted into three houses 85 yards further on and was destroyed by fire.
All 5 crew and 15 passengers on board died along with a Mrs Wilding and her young son David at house number 25. House numbers 21 and 23 were also destroyed but were thankfully unoccupied at the time of the accident.
PROBABLE CAUSE
It appeared that the starboard aileron became locked when the No.2 flap unit moved away from the wing trailing edge following the failure of a flap fitting. The fracture of a 9/16 inch bolt holding the bottom of the No.2 starboard flap unit was probably caused by metal fatigue.
SOURCE:
ICAO Accident Digest No.9, Circular 56-AN/51 (76-87).
18 March 1957
Registration cancelled as aircraft written off.
Total time 6,900 hours and 4,553 landings (also reported as 3,450 landings).
After an investigation of the crash remains inside a hangar at Ringway Airport, Manchester the remains were transferred to Coley's scrap yard at Hounslow, Middlesex, England which was near London Airport.
A modification was devised by Vickers-Armstrongs and Marshalls of Cambridge were contracted by BEA to carry out the work to their fleet of 25 aircraft. The V.701 fleet was temporarily grounded and each aircraft was modified at a suitable maintenance facility. G-AMOF (C/N 19), G-AMOI (C/N 22) and G-ANHB (C/N 62) were modified at Ringway Airport, Manchester, England.
Some, including G-AMOL (C/N 25) were ferried from London Airport to Teversham Airport, Cambridge by a Marshalls crew and as a precaution landed without flaps. Because of the serious nature of this failure the work was carried out as a high priority. Obviously this also affected other Viscounts all around the world.
1 September 1958
The remains were still in Coley's scrap yard at Hounslow, Middlesex, England, near London Airport (Heathrow).
FURTHER READING: Books about BEA - British European Airways
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