Court Line

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Court Line
Former type Public
Fate Collapsed
Founded 1960
Defunct 1974
Headquarters Luton, UK
Industry Travel

Court Line was a prominent British holiday charter airline during the early 1970s based at Luton Airport in Bedfordshire. It also provided bus services in Luton and surrounding areas.

It helped pioneer the concept of "cheap and cheerful" package tours to Spain and other destinations in the "Med" in conjunction with Clarksons Holidays, thus taking part in the establishment of a whole new way of holidaymaking for the British public.

Both the airline and its associated tour operator went bankrupt in August 1974.

Contents

[edit] Autair - the beginning

Autair International BAC One-Eleven series 416 at Manchester in 1969

The airline, which was originally named "Argus Air Transport", was formed at London Luton Airport in 1957.[1] In 1960 it became "Autair (Luton)" and subsequently changed to "Autair International Airways". Autair started operations in 1961 with one Douglas DC-3 used on contract work for other operators. More DC-3s and Vickers Vikings were bought to operate both freight and passenger services, including a growing number of inclusive tour (IT) flights. The Airspeed Ambassador was introduced in 1963, followed by a leased Handley Page Herald - Autair's first turboprop.

In October 1963 the airline commenced scheduled services between Blackpool and Luton. In the following years all piston-engined aircraft types were withdrawn and replaced with turboprop types (Hawker Siddeley 748 and Handley Page Herald). In 1966 the Court Line Shipping Company took a controlling interest in the airline. Additional scheduled services within the UK - including London-Teesside[2] - were operated with Heralds. Five BAC One-Eleven 400 series jets were introduced to operate IT flights.

In October 1969 scheduled services were stopped and all turboprop aircraft sold. This was followed by an order for the bigger 500 series One-Eleven. During that period Autair's Luton-based helicopter interests were hived off into a separate company as well.[1]

[edit] Court Line - the re-launch

To coincide with the arrival of the first BAC One-Eleven 500, the airline changed its name on the 1 January 1970 to "Court Line" and introduced a new corporate look and strategy that focused exclusively on the then fast-growing package holiday market. As the larger One-Eleven 500s were delivered, all but one of the smaller former Autair 400 series One-Elevens were retired.

The corporate look was an all-over colour design by Peter Murdoch. One-Elevens were painted in the following distinctive, eye-catching pastel colour combinations: yellow/gold/orange, pink/rose/magenta, pale violet/mauve/purple, light green/mid-green/forest green (named Halcyon Skies), in keeping with the holiday "feelgood-factor". Aircrew wore trendy uniforms designed by Mary Quant. This was part of making passengers feel that the flight was a "fun part" of their holiday. For many, it would be their first flying experience.

Other airlines were quick to jump on the burgeoning package tour bandwagon. Thus, in the early 1970s a holiday in Majorca or on the Costa del Sol became affordable to the average person for the first time.

[edit] The widebody era

In 1973 Court Line was the first European airline to order and take delivery of a pair of Lockheed L-1011 Tristar widebodies.[3] This was a big gamble as the new jets had about three-and-a-half times the One-Eleven's passenger capacity (400 vs. 119). Court took the view that the market would grow and that such large aircraft could be operated profitably. In addition, it was looking to expand into new holiday markets in the US and the Caribbean. This at the time was wholly new territory for the UK package tour market.

[edit] Hard times

The gamble failed to pay off.

At the time the UK was in the grip of a recession as a result of the early 1970s energy crisis caused by OPEC's oil boycott of the West in the aftermath of the 1973 Arab-Israeli War. This was a punitive measure directed against these countries for their support of Israel during that war. It led to a drastic reduction in the availability of petroleum products - including jet fuel, resulting in a quadrupling of the oil price. 1974 also became known as the worst year for the UK package tour industry. Clarksons, Court Line's main customer, was facing mounting financial pressure and Vladimir Raitz's Horizon Holidays, another of the airline's major customers, collapsed during that year. Following Court Line's purchase of Horizon Holidays for a nominal £1 from the administrator[1], the airline decided to purchase Clarksons as well to prevent it from going the same way as Horizon and to try to protect its business. However, Clarksons financial position further deteriorated during the course of that year. In a desperate attempt to fill the group's planes and hotel rooms so that it could stay afloat, Clarksons began selling its holiday packages below cost[4], with a fortnight all-inclusive holiday to Majorca selling for as little as £50.

[edit] The end

On 15 August 1974, the company went bankrupt, with all flights cancelled, its charter fleet comprising two Tristars and nine One-Eleven 500s grounded, all 1,150 staff losing their jobs and as many as 49,000 holidaymakers stranded overseas with no means of getting home.[5][6][1]

As a result of this, the Association of British Travel Agents (ABTA) set up a fund to provide an insurance against such an event in the future.

The following day (16 August 1974) all of the group's UK-based subsidiaries went into voluntary liquidation. This included both Court Line and Clarksons.

[edit] Factors behind collapse

In addition to the early-'70s oil crisis, there were other factors that had caused the collapse of the group of companies that included Court Line and Clarksons.

One of these factors was the parent company's precariously highly geared investment in the shipping and leisure industry sectors.

According to some insider reports at the time, Court Line itself was a viable business. However, a proposed management buyout was rejected as its liquidation value was needed to pay off the parent company's debts.

The Department of Trade and Industry final report [7] into the Court Line collapse concludes:

"The short answer is that there was no single reason for the collapse, which was caused by a number of contributory factors. Court Line expanded rapidly in many directions, some of which were both logical and justifiable, others not. The overall management was throughout inadequate and it was in any event never supported by the necessary financial control. This meant that as Court Line expanded, it became progressively vulnerable to any substantial setback in any of its areas of activities. When a serious setback occurred, triggered off by the oil crisis of autumn 1973, it immediately affected the shipping, aviation, and leisure divisions. The group was so highly geared, so structured and having such inadequate financial control, that it might well have been brought down by a substantial reverse in any of its major activities. As it was the cumulative effect on all three divisions, when all the cash resources which would otherwise have been available had been invested unprofitably in the Caribbean, meant that the position progressively deteriorated and rendered the collapse in August 1974 unavoidable."

[edit] Disposal of airline's assets

Following the spectacular crash of Court Line and Clarksons at the height of the 1974 holiday season, the failed carrier's fairly new aircraft were acquired by other airlines. Cathay Pacific took the L-1011 Tristar widebodies while Dan-Air and Monarch Airlines respectively purchased four and two of the One-Eleven 500 narrowbodies.

[edit] Facts of Interest

  • Court Line had two wholly owned subsidiaries. These were Leeward Islands Air Transport (LIAT), a regional airline based in the Caribbean, and Court Line Helicopters, based in South Africa. Both of these subsidiaries survived the spectacular Court Line crash of August 1974.
  • Dan-Air and Monarch needed to re-register the aircraft they acquired from Court Line to avoid these planes being impounded by overseas airport authorities in lieu of the airport user charges the failed airline owed them.[7][8][9]

[edit] Aircraft operated (Autair International)

[edit] Aircraft operated (Court Line)

[edit] 1970 Fleet and employee data

Court Line fleet in 1970 [10]
Aircraft Total Orders Notes
BAC One-Eleven 400 1 0
BAC One-Eleven 500 7 0
Bell JetRanger 1
Total 8 0

Court Line employed 670 people at that time (as of March 1970).[10]

[edit] Accidents/incidents

Autair suffered two accidents, one of which involved the loss of lives.[11]

The first of these occurred on 14 September 1967. One of the airline's Ambassadors (registration: G-ALZS[12]) overran the runway at Luton Airport at the end of a non-scheduled passenger flight from Luxembourg. The aircraft had approached Luton in darkness. Visibility was 1,800m and the cloud base 300 ft. Following touchdown, the pilot in command retracted the aircraft's flaps in the takeoff position and applied brakes intermittently. The aircraft overshot the runway and came to a stop in soft clay. This caused the undercarriage to collapse. The aircraft was damaged beyond repair and had to be written off.[13] However, there were no fatalities among the 69 occupants (four crew and 64 passengers).[14]

The second took place on 23 December 1967. A Hawker Siddeley HS 125 (registration: G-AVGW) crashed shortly after taking off from Luton Airport, killing both pilots. The aircraft had been on a training flight. The crash occurred when the crew simulated an engine failure on takeoff. The HS 125 lost height rapidly and hit the roof of a nearby factory. This resulted in a post-crash fire.[15]

A Court Line aircraft was involved in a runway collision at Luton Airport. This accident killed one of the occupants of the other aircraft.

On 18 April 1974 a BAC One-Eleven 518FG (registration: G-AXMJ) operating flight OU95 from Luton to Munich was awaiting Luton Ground Movement Control (GMC) clearance to take off from runway 08. The aircraft was cleared to enter the runway and backtrack, which was correctly read back by the pilot in command prior to receiving tower clearance to begin its takeoff roll. While the One-Eleven's flightdeck crew acknowledged this, another aircraft, a Piper PA-23-250C Aztec belonging to McAlpine Aviation (registration: G-AYDE), was taxiing towards the same runway. The Piper Aztec's pilot had expressed his preference to use runway 26 for takeoff. GMC initially cleared the Piper to taxi to the intersection of the west and east taxiways. Shortly afterwards, GMC amended this clearance and instructed the smaller aircraft to hold at point Alpha in preparation for take-off from runway 26. The Piper's pilot acknowledged this instruction. When GMC asked him to indicate that he was ready for take off, he replied that he was ready to take off in 30 seconds. Meanwhile, the Aztec continued to taxi beyond holding point Alpha towards the runway. The Piper's only passenger, an experienced pilot who occupied the right hand front seat, queried the pilot on the aircraft's intercom whether he had obtained clearance to taxi beyond Alpha. By the time the Piper's passenger realised that the pilot had not heard him, the Aztec was already on the runway. At that time the One-Eleven was under the first officer's control from the right hand seat while the commander was carrying out co-pilot duties from the left seat. During the initial phase of the takeoff run, the commander was occupied with instrument readings. This prevented him from looking out of the cockpit window until the aircraft reached about 100 knots. At that moment both One-Eleven pilots spotted the Aztec entering the runway from the left. When it dawned on them that the Aztec was not going to stop, the One-Eleven's commander took over control and fully opened both throttles. He then steered the aircraft as far as possible to the right and, at the same time, attempted to raise the port wing over the Aztec to avert a potentially fatal collision. When the Aztec's passenger saw the One-Eleven fast approaching from his right, there was just enough time for him to duck before the collision occurred. Consequently, there was no time to warn the pilot before the outer six metres of the One-Eleven's port wing struck the Aztec. The collision damaged both of the Aztec's propellers and sliced off its cabin top. This killed the Aztec's pilot instantly and injured its passenger. It also severely damaged the One-Eleven's port wing, which began leaking large quantities of jet fuel. Immediately upon impact, the One-Eleven's commander aborted takeoff and advised the tower accordingly. Using full reverse thrust and applying maximum braking power managed to bring the One-Eleven to a halt within 750 metres. This was well within the remaining length of the runway. The commander then ordered the aircraft to be evacuated because of the risk of fire due to the fuel leakage from the port wing. Evacuation was delayed when the cabin staff had difficulty in opening the two forward exits in order to deploy the escape slides. Eventually, after using considerable force, the commander himself was able to open both doors and the evacuation proceeded smoothly without injury to crew and passengers. Fortunately, the leaking fuel did not catch fire.

The accident investigation established that the Aztec pilot's failure to comply with an ATC instruction to hold his aircraft clear of the runway at a properly defined holding point was the accident's primary cause. This resulted in the aircraft taxiing on to the runway into the path of another aircraft that was taking off. The Luton GMC controller's non-standard phraseology when issuing this instruction together with the absence of any additional safeguards to ensure aircraft's compliance with ATC instructions when approaching the holding point were considered to be important contributory factors.[16]

[edit] Code Data

  • IATA Code: OU
  • Callsign:

[edit] Notes

  1. ^ a b c d The bubble bursts, Air Transport, Flight International, 22 August 1974, p. 198
  2. ^ British Midland's double anniversary, Flight International, 6 May 1978, p. 1390
  3. ^ TriStar foot in Europe's door, Air Transport ..., Flight International, 4 November 1971, p. 719
  4. ^ World's charter airlines, Flight International, 10 October 1974, p. 460
  5. ^ World Airline Directory 1974, Flight International, 21 March 1974, p. 31
  6. ^ Bringing them back home, World News, Flight International, 22 August 1974, p. 197
  7. ^ Airliner Market, Air Transport, Flight International, 23 January 1975, p. 89
  8. ^ Airliner Market, Air Transport, Flight International, 13 March 1975, p. 391
  9. ^ BAC One-Eleven, Commercial Aircraft of the World, Flight International, 23 October 1975, p. 625
  10. ^ a b World Airlines 1970, Flight International, 26 March 1970, p. 479
  11. ^ [1]
  12. ^ [2]
  13. ^ [3]
  14. ^ [4]
  15. ^ [5]
  16. ^ [6]

[edit] References/external links

  • Merton Jones, T. (1972). British Independent Airline & Operators Since 1947. UK: LAAS International. NONE. 
  • Flight International. Sutton, UK: Reed Business Information. ISSN 0015-3710.  (various backdated issues relating to Autair/Court Line, 1960-1974)
  • Eglin, Roger, and Ritchie, Berry (1980). Fly me, I'm Freddie. London, UK: Weidenfeld and Nicolson. ISBN 0-2977-7746-7. 
  • Thomson, Adam (1999). High Risk: The Politics of the Air. London, UK: Sidgwick and Jackson. ISBN 0-2839-9599-8. 
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