JET AGE: Triumphs And Failures. The Early Battle For Air Dominance: Boeing Vs. De Havilland

DroneScapes
DroneScapes
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Published 2024-04-13
The early battle for air dominance after WW2. The Jet Age revolution of post WW2.
De Havilland against Boeing, Tupolev, and many other aviation innovators.
The De Havilland Comet became the first passenger jet airliner in the world, initially powered by Frank Whittle's turbojet, the British inventor who, contrary to popular belief, had a working turbojet before Germany in April 1937.
Some initial mistakes are reminiscent of today's issues with companies like Boeing, who also had initial teething problems, just like De Havilland's notorious issue with their Comet.
The de Havilland DH.106 Comet is the world's first commercial jet airliner. Developed and manufactured by de Havilland in the United Kingdom, the Comet 1 prototype first flew in 1949. It features an aerodynamically clean design, four de Havilland Ghost turbojet engines buried in the wing roots, a pressurized cabin, and large windows. It offered a relatively quiet, comfortable passenger cabin for the era and was commercially promising at its debut in 1952.

Within a year of the airliner's entry into service, three Comets were lost in highly publicized accidents after suffering catastrophic mishaps mid-flight. Two of these were found to be caused by structural failure resulting from metal fatigue in the airframe, a phenomenon not fully understood at the time; the other was due to overstressing of the airframe during flight through severe weather. The Comet was withdrawn from service and extensively tested. Design and construction flaws were ultimately identified, including improper riveting and dangerous stress concentrations around square cut-outs for the ADF (automatic direction finder) antennas. As a result, the Comet was extensively redesigned with structural reinforcements and other changes. Rival manufacturers heeded the lessons from the Comet when developing their aircraft.

Although sales never fully recovered, the improved Comet 2 and the prototype Comet 3 culminated in the redesigned Comet 4 series, which debuted in 1958 and remained in commercial service until 1981. The Comet was also adapted for various military roles such as VIP, medical, passenger transport, and surveillance; the last Comet 4, used as a research platform, made its final flight in 1997. The most extensive modification resulted in a specialized maritime patrol derivative, the Hawker Siddeley Nimrod, which remained in service with the Royal Air Force until 2011, over 60 years after the Comet's first flight.

The Comet was involved in 25 hull-loss accidents, including 13 fatal crashes, which resulted in 492 fatalities.[186] Pilot error was blamed for the type's first fatal accident, which occurred during takeoff at Karachi, Pakistan, on 3 March 1953 and involved a Canadian Pacific Airlines Comet 1A.[82] Three fatal Comet 1 crashes were due to structural problems, specifically British Overseas Airways Corporation flight 783 on 2 May 1953, British Overseas Airways Corporation flight 781 on 10 January 1954, and South African Airways flight 201 on 8 April 1954, led to the grounding of the entire Comet fleet. After design modifications were implemented, Comet services resumed on October 4, 1958, with Comet 4s.

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#comet #Boeing #aviation
All Comments (17)
  • @martinhumble
    Amazing work. Great documentary, editing, upscaling and - well everything. Hats off!!
  • @stevenreyes3680
    I was going to say something… I took a 747 to Hawaii in 1971. I came back 6 months later on a 707. It felt like a race car compared to the family wagon ? More like a Winnebago… PS I didn’t know it started out as a tanker…
  • @drstevenrey
    Unbelievable how cocky the British were then and now. When the simple fact of history is, that Britain drove any form of technical industry face first into the ground and today have completely disappeared from the scene altogether. Sad but inevitable.
  • @user-kw5qv6zl5e
    The placement of engines (totally rear or underwiing) is an interesting study. In the end look at if like this...rear engines ...top tail.. thats a lot of stuff to put in a place it "sort of looks like it doesnt balance" You are totally balancing hardware (engines) with consumables (fuel) farther forward. The centre of gravity and the centre of lift are alaays in the move in both cases. So lets say now we have an elevator problem...or an engine out...straight away we see in rear engine ...YAW...big time ..pushed from the back...its better to "tow" a plane from the front (middle) ...think of a shopping trolley...its worse push from the back..drag it from the front ..hard but better...you notice the effort is less. Only until the F16 fighter turned up did we see beautiful "ouf of control " casters"
  • @awuma
    Lovely film sequences, but quite often the spoken commentary is not about what is being shown (e.g. talk about turboprops when only piston engined aircraft are being shown). Not a single Viscount shown during the first Viscount segment.
  • @brucegibbins3792
    In their rush to be first to fly a passenger jet, the British were doomed to produce a flawed aircraft. In contrast, American aircraft manufacturers, took what time was nessesery to release a more utilitarian design and more reliable airliners that quickly became the preferred choice of Airlines around the world. The British were masters of innovation, yet much less so in implementation.
  • @drstevenrey
    George Edward, or as I like to call him, the closeted ventriloquist.
  • @PeteSty
    Jet Age? Boeing vs de Havilland? This is Lockheed vs Douglas. And they aren't jets!
  • @user-kw5qv6zl5e
    The mode of failure you describe is NOT CORRECT!!!!....NOTHING TO DO WITH WINDOWS...The skylight-aerial hole in the top was the origin...it ENDED AT the windows ...rounding square windows was a rectification which LOOKED as if this was the cause
  • @u47mkbg
    First !:medal-yellow-first-red: