British Caledonian: The Intercontinental Routes, 1977

Reprinted with kind permission from the wonderful Airline Memorabilia blog is the inside jacket cover of a British Caledonian timetable, showing the airline's intercontinental services at the height of the airline's reach.

A dozen routes shower out from London (Gatwick) to South America and Africa, with service across the Canary Islands and North Africa.

In West Africa, Dakar, Banjul, Freetown and Monrovia (previously posted on Timetablist) are interwoven, with the cooperative operations of Sierra Leone Airways from Gatwick to Robertsfield via Lungi also shown. Accra, Lagos and Kano form another subgroup.

Central and Southern Africa are only sparsely served in a triangulated service linking Kinshasa and Lusaka, with a connecting service to the Zambian copperbelt capital of Ndola. Presumably, British Airways had rights that dominated East and Southern Africa, from Kenya to yet-to-be independent Rhodesia.

The next post will cover the South American services of the same map. Thanks again to Airline Memorabilia for the privileges.

Sierra Leone Airways Timetable, October 1963

More on the commercial aviation of Sierra Leone, past and present. Yesterday's philatelic feature celebrating Sierra Leone Airlines leads into an earlier exploration of that carrier's history, when it was known as Sierra Leone Airways in earlier decades. Here, courtesy of Björn Larsson and his website Timetable Images, is the timetable of Sierra Leone Airways in October 1963 to March 1964.

A quad-propeller Bristol Britannia offered non-stop weekly service from London to Lungi International Airport, boasting a first class cabin and an economy class offering. The bottom half of the left page is taken up by tables showing the weekly "Up-country" services, operated by a de Havilland Heron from Freetown's smaller Hastings Airport. The second table shows a "link-up" service, which ferries intercontinental passengers to the origination of this domestic route. Fares, baggage allowances, and passenger regulations are detailed at right.

Sierra Leone Airlines over Freetown, 1987

Thursday's post detailed the launch of Sierra Leone's new carrier, concurrent with the 50th anniversary of the country's independence. In honor of another jubilee, in this case the 40th Anniversary of the International Civil Aviation Organization in 1987, the Republic of Sierra Leone issued this commemorative stamp. The horizon line demarcating the dull-blue, rainy season sky and a calm Atlantic is nearly imperceptible. The foreground shows a wide, intricately detailed view of the rooftops of Freetown. Sierra Leone Airlines' flagship B707-384C with its landing gear flared for landing at Lungi International across the bay, surrounded by the stamp's perforation.