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Role | Airliner |
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National origin | United Kingdom |
Manufacturer | Vickers-Armstrongs |
First flight | 20 January 1959 |
Introduction | 17 December 1960 (by British European Airways) |
Retired | 17 October 1996 |
Primary users | British European Airways Trans-Canada Air Lines |
Number built | 44 |
Developed from | Vickers Viscount |
The Vanguard entered service with BEA and TCA in late 1960. BEA operated its first Vanguard schedule on 17 December from Heathrow to Paris. Following delivery of its full fleet of six V951 and 14 V953 aircraft by 30 March 1962, the type took over many of BEA's busier European and UK trunk routes. The aircraft received names of famous Royal Navy warships; the first (registered G-APEA) was named "Vanguard", however by the time that the aircraft were delivered, BEA had adopted its new "red square" livery, which saw the end of naming and none of the Vanguards actually carried a name. Initial seating was 18 first-class at the rear and 108 tourist, but this was changed to 139 all-tourist, in which configuration the Vanguard had very low operating costs per seat-mile. On flights up to 300 miles (480 km), such as from London to Paris, Brussels and Amsterdam, the type could match the block times of the pure jets which were being introduced in the early 1960s. The remaining BEA fleet passed to British Airways (BA) on 1 April 1974 and the last BA passenger flight with the type was on 16 June 1974.
TCA initiated Vanguard schedules on 1 February 1961 with two flights from Toronto and Montreal via intermediate stops to Vancouver. The fleet was also used on services from Toronto and Montreal to New York and Nassau, Bahamas. Tyne engine reliability was a concern to the airline in the early 1960s. It had a Constellation on stand-by at Dorval Airport in Montreal and at Toronto to take Vanguard passengers in case an engine failed to start.
In 1966, Air Canada removed all the seats from one of its aircraft and refitted for pure cargo work, in which role it could carry 42,000 lb (19,000 kg) of freight. Known by the airline as the "Cargoliner", it was the only such conversion, but survived to be the last Canadian Vanguard to be retired in December 1972
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The origins of the Vanguard can be traced back to speculative discussions between Vickers and the airline British European Airways (BEA) conducted as early as 1953, the same year in which the commercially successful Vickers Viscount airliner first entered revenue service.
The Type 900 was a further revision of the design, featuring an expanded payload capacity of 21,000 lb (9,500 kg) and carry up to 93 passengers
The launch of the programme commenced immediately following BEA's initial order for the type.