Page 16 - AAA MAY - JUNE 2019 Online Magazine

[ COMMERCIAL AVIATION ]

Flying

High

at 50!

AIRBUS HAS ENSURED EUROPE
REMAINS AN AVIATION
POWERHOUSE
France started the Airbus programme in 1966 with one engineer
Roger Beteille and a secretary. Beteille seized on a specification
Geoffrey Thomas from American Airlines for the twin-engine Airbus that would fly
Fifty years ago, as the first 747 took flight the medium ranges with 250 passengers, which he believed would
commercial world of aviation was dominated give his own ideas greater credibility.
by the giant aerospace companies on the West
Coast of the US – Boeing, McDonnell Douglas The Seed of Cooperation
and Lockheed, which accounted for over 95 In 1966, France, Germany and Britain agreed to cooperate on
per cent of all aircraft sold. Europe’s aviation the Airbus project and by April of 1967 funds were flowing to the
landscape was one of broken dreams with project team. However, by 1969, Britain’s Rolls Royce, which was
production runs mostly below 50 while Boeing to have responsibility for the Airbus engine, was committed to
and McDonnell Douglas counted their sales in Lockheed’s Tristar and withdrew from the programme. Germany
the many hundreds and eventually thousands and France proceeded as equal partners and General Electric (GE)
sending unit cost plummeting. won the right to power the aircraft after agreeing to give major
work to French engine company Snecma; an incredibly successful
A Rocky Start association that continues to this day. The founding fathers of
Britain, France, Germany, Holland, Sweden and Airbus were Beteille, German aerospace manufacturing genius
Italy had formidable aircraft design and engi- Felix Kracht, Aerospatiale chairman Henri Ziegler and German
neering capability, but unity was an overriding politician Franz-Josef Strauss. The twin-engine jumbo was born.
problem as well as the scale of the local market. Well, almost. Something important was missing. Britain’s Hawker
Only the Vickers Viscount used widely across Siddeley, now part of British Aerospace, was to build the wing but
the globe, the Sud Aviation Caravelle and there was no government funding when Britain withdrew. Designing
Fokker’s F-27 Friendship also used extensively and building the wing is critical and the British had extensive expe-
had established themselves as truly successful rience in wing design. The Germans knew this, and a solution was
programs. Thus, as Airbus celebrates its for- found, whereby the German Government funded Hawker Siddeley’s
mation 50 years ago it was not surprising that participation.
most of the aviation world just laughed it off as
just another attempt by Europe’s dysfunctional A Success in the Making
aviation industry to launch a commercial airliner But while technically Airbus had struck the right formula, sales
programme. Europeans had been searching did not flow immediately. The company had a host of barriers to
for ways to cooperate for years to combat the overcome, including import duty into the US, lack of a track record,
dominance of the US airline industry. By the airlines bloated with 747s, DC-10s and Tristars, and the fuel crisis
late 1960s the economic reality of coopera- of 1973. The A300, however, was the right aircraft for the airlines,
tion was finally overcoming national pride and burning 25 per cent less fuel per passenger than the 727-200,

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