London Heathrows safety record

[Gonzo]

09R is straight ahead to 3000ft.
09L is climb to 3000ft, and turn left to track 040 on passing 1500ft (or threshold, whichever is later),
27R is climb to 3000ft, and turn right to track 310 on passing 1500ft (or the threshold..........),

27L is climb to 2000ft, turn left to track 150 on passing 1000ft (or the threshold.......).

When TOGA is applied, many types have problems not climbing past 2000ft.

[Al]

When I worked at Heathrow in the late 1980s, I vaguely remember a B747 (Air Canada?) losing a wheel, it bouncing over our office, and demolishing several parked cars in the long-stay car park...

I salvaged this photo from an office which was being demolished at Heathrow, showing the Lufthansa B720 after its nosegear mishap in '62...

[EGTC]

Thankyou kindly Gonzo. Now I see why its an interesting one to fly.

Al, which runway did that LH land on? Nice photo.

[Al]

Judging by the orientation of the ATC tower, it landed on 09L (10L then?), finishing near where the tunnel roads go under the runway...

[longshot]

Excellent photo, thanks...it stayed on top of the tunnel on 10L through much of the day

[EGTC]

Thanks for clarifying.
I dont suppose there are any overhead photos of LHR from around the 50's through to the 80's are there? It would be nice to see how it changed over that period of time.

[PeeDee]

Thanks for clarifying.
I dont suppose there are any overhead photos of LHR from around the 50's through to the 80's are there? It would be nice to see how it changed over that period of time.

I've just checked and failed.......but I thought Google Earth or Google maps had a history button where you could see the above view from any they had on record. Obviously photo's not Satellite images.
I've seen it somewhere and it would have been something as popular as Google as I don't wander too far into the net.

[Gonzo]

There is a series of five aerial photos in the tower atrium from various dates between 1949-1998, so the photos exist somewhere.

[Al]

Here's some Googled images...
C1945...

C1954...


C1955...

[Al]

C1956 from PPrune...

[rochford]

I think i can see my bike in that last pic!

[tornado64]

Google Earth or Google maps had a history button where you could see the above view from any they had on record. Obviously photo's not Satellite images.
.

google earth is all photographed!! satelite images are not clear enough mainly it was photographed from aircraft in the v/late 90's early 2000's but is updated occasionaly !!

[EGTC]

Incredible! Thanks for the photos. Its interesting how heathrow has developed over time Thanks alot for that

[VeeOne]

Here is Terminal 2 and QB in 1959. No T1 as yet. At that time T2 was called No1 Passenger Terminal. By 1962 it was called Europa Terminal with the new Terminal 3 being called Oceanic Terminal.

If you want to see maps of how the airport was in 1961, 1965 and 1968 I can post these maps.

[EGTC]

Thats a lovely photo there! Very nice and clear
I'd love to see the maps Thankyou kindly.

[Bmused55]

Look at the total lack of any fences, walls, etc. You could walk onto the apron from the street!

I was born in the wrong era methinks.

[mrtotty]

Indeed you could. I remember looking at a series of photos showing a Qantas B707 landing at Auckland Airport for the first time and there were a group of small boys parked up with their bicycles on the apron watching.
Imagine that happening now (though I suspect New Zealand isn't quite as obsessive now as the UK is when it comes to child 'safety'.).

[Gonzo]

I loked at the prints in the tower just now and they are all from Hunting Aerofilms. Looking at Wikipedia it seems to suggest that the archive of aerial shots of Britain is available at the National Monuments Record in Swindon.

[VeeOne]

I'd love to see the maps Thankyou kindly.

LONDON AIRPORT IN 1961, 1964, 1967...


(If anyone would like to see the labels for the maps I can upload that part of the maps too.


1961-62...






1964-65...






1967-68...

[EGTC]

Brilliant
Was runway 23R used for take off's only when runway 23L was used for landings?
When was runway 23R and also 33L (I think?) removed?

[VeeOne]

Brilliant
Was runway 23R used for take off's only when runway 23L was used for landings?
When was runway 23R and also 33L (I think?) removed?

I think all the runways were used initially when the traffic was C-47 and Lancastrian types but I don't think they used runways other than what they mark as runway 1, 2 and 5 (28R/10L, 23L/05R and 28L/10R) by the 1960s even though these maps show approach lighting on all runways. But i am sure there are others who will know for sure.

[EGTC]

Ahh I see! Thanks very much for that info, Vee. Being born in 1984 I only saw the usual runways and runway 23 in action so I wasnt really sure if the other runways prior to that were used or not.

[longshot]

Hi Longshot. That 747 that almost hit the hotels was flown by the captain alone as the first officer was ill. He established on the false localiser which took him down the ILS slightly to the right of the true localiser. Very low cloud meant he only popped out into VMC tens of feet above the hotels. The CAA and the press hounded him with talk of imprisonment even though it was British Airways' policy to pressure crews to take flights out whatever problems the crew had. This pilot committed suicide due to the pressure and the ignominous end to his career. Sad. Because despite the ILS error he performed as a top pilot under impossible conditions and saved the day.

I've just been reading an article about the case on pprune....terrible shame
http://www.pprune.org/aviation-histo...ml#post4538047

[longshot]

Hallo Veeone....Thought you might enjoy these as a fellow Heathrobsessive!There are some rather atmospheric photos of LT buses mixing it with airliners on the new London Transport Museum Pick&Mix website (search term 'airport')
http://www.pickmix.co.uk/explore?s=airport&t=

some samples
http://www.pickmix.co.uk/199845100-bw-print-colin-tait
http://www.pickmix.co.uk/199871954-b...-topical-press
http://www.pickmix.co.uk/199885334-b...r-heinz-zinram
http://www.pickmix.co.uk/199856550-b...t-w-h-r-godwin
http://www.pickmix.co.uk/199845063-b...t-w-h-r-godwin
http://www.pickmix.co.uk/199885018-b...t-w-h-r-godwin
http://www.pickmix.co.uk/199885518-b...t-w-h-r-godwin
http://www.pickmix.co.uk/199856557-bw-print-colin-tait

The shots with the VC-10s didn't need to be arranged, thats how it was on the road from Harlington Corner to Hatton Cross from the late 1950s till the early 2000s, I think.

The Topical Press photo is with a USAF/MATS C-54 which were fairly common visitors in the 1950s.

The Pick&Mix site has lots of Aerofilms aerial shots of London and suburbs

[garryrussell]

I don't myself class G-ARPI as a Heathrow incident, it had flown away from the airport.

One that is missing is Skyways Hermes G-ALDH, written off in an undercarriage collapse on landing LHR 8th March 1960

But all this is not a Heathrow thing. Most airports in the UK see a similar trend as aviation has got a lot safer. I think it mimics aviation safety in general in the UK at least.

Compare for example, the amount of crashes BEA and BOAC had with British Airways who have had only three write off incidents I can think of in their existance and only one of those was fatal.

Trident 3B G-AWZT in a mid air collision over Zagreb was the fatal

The other two were Trident 1E G-AVYD (technically still Northeast then) in a overrun on an aborted take off at Bilbao and the of course G-YMMM the Boeing 777 coming down short on 09L.

There was of course the high profile One-Eleven window blow out and emergency landing at Southampton with the captain hanging out of the window, but full blown crashes are less common now.

This despite the tremendous increase in air traffic over the early days.

I didn't include the Boeing 737 of British Airtours at Manchester as that was a seperate airline, of G-APFK the KT Boeing 707 that csarshed landed on a training flight, but if you do it's still impressive.

OK there have been numerous runway excursions, burst tyres and wheels ups etc., but such incidents although major news now...like the recent Blue Islands ATR at Jersey, would not have got more than a brief mention if at all in the past.

So if anything aviation looks a great deal safer than it used to be but is actually even safer than it appears due to the raised profiles of contemporary minor incident.

[longshot]

Apologies for not acknowledging the original thread starter correctly...Wyvernfan...I thought the bus photos had a security interest if not a safety one....do the links work OK if you're not signed up to the LT Pick&Mix site?