2019 is a special year for British Airways, the largest airline in the United Kingdom. On 25 August it will be exactly 100 years ago that the predecessor of British Airways, Aircraft Transport and Travel (AT&T), carried out her first regular flight.
On 5 October 1916, Aircraft Transport and Travel was founded by George Holt Thomas. The very first flight was between Folkestone and the Belgian city of Ghent. The first regular flight did not take place until August 25, 1919. You could buy a ticket and you got a flight of 2 hours and a half that brought you from Hounslow Heath Aerodrome to Paris – Le Bourget Airport. The flight was carried out with an Airco DH.16, a British commercial plane with four seats.
Over the years, the network expanded with flights between London (Croydon Airport) and Amsterdam.
Later on, several other airlines were set up in the UK. Many merged, which led to name changes. The management of AT&T was taken over by Frank Searle of Daimler Hire, a limousine-hire-service. AT&T got into debt, so it creased its operations in 1921, but a small part continued to fly as Daimler Airway Limited. This airline later merged with Handley Page Transport, Instone Air Line and British Marine Air Navigation into Imperial Airways. Imperial merged in 1939 with British Airways Ltd and formed British Overseas Airways Corporation (BOAC). In 1974 BOAC merged with British European Airways (BEA) to form the current British Airways.
Like you see, British Airways has a big aviation history and that’s why the airline painted four aircraft in a special scheme: 1 Boeing 747-400 in BOAC colors, 1 Boeing 747-400 in the old Negus Livery, 1 Boeing 747-400 in the Landor Livery and 1 Airbus A319 in the colors of BEA. To celebrate the special day, this 3 747-400’s will be used on domestic routes. British Airways hasn’t let us know yet, but you can deduce it from the booking system, reports Routes Online.
It’s about the following flights:
London Heathrow to Glasgow, departure at 12:00, London Heathrow to Manchester, departure at 10:10 and London Heathrow to Newcastle, departure at 09:20. All times are local times.
The British airline continues to look for renewal and new routes. Yesterday, on 3 June, they relaunched the route London – Islamabad in Pakistan. It is the first time in 10 years that the airline has flown back to the country in Central Asia.
Last update:
People who had booked a flight got a message from British Airways that they will not carry out the flights with the special 747s
