1944 - 49

In 19.. the U.K Westminster Parliament discussed Post War Civil Aviation.
Mr W.R.D. Perkins (Con. Stroud) asked Clem Atlee, the Deputy Prime Minister, to consider the appointment of an additional Permanent Under-Secretary of State to the Air Ministry to take charge of civil aviation.
Others sought a different solution; the setting up of a new Ministry of Civil Aviation. Alan J Cobham, K.B.E., A.F.C (nicknamed "The Apostle of Civil Aviation,") wrote an article in the February Flight: “…. It is far too big and virile an industry to be tacked onto an existing Ministry, and the very nature of its ever-changing developments, inventions and progress would make collaboration with another Ministry unworkable. Therefore, let us start off by having a new Ministry of Civil Aviation.”

1944 - 1949
1944

The Civil Aviation Flying Unit was conceived in 1944 when the Air Ministry (AM), prompted by Government concerns as to what would happen to post-war civil aviation, set up a small unit at Croydon. The fleet at this time was first called the Civil Operations Fleet (COF) and was inaugurated with the objective of providing facilities for:

Operational trials etc.;
Refresher flying by qualified pilots among the Operational, Control and Signals staff;
Radio d...........

Two Autocrat Austers G-AGLK and G-AGLL, together with a Percival ProctoEdit r G-AGLJ were first registered to the Air Ministry in .........., and later transferred to the newly formed Ministry of .............

Photo: Courtesy Eddy Harris

Both Austers and Proctor were intended for communication work.

Photo: Courtesy Tony Doyle

By October of 44 the COF had the first of many Avro Ansons, G-AGLM, registered to them. Unfortunately, no photographs found:
Also in the same month, October, the Government announced the setting up of a new Ministry to look after Civil Aviation, the Ministry of Civil Aviation (MCA).

1945

The MCA properly came into existence in J........ with Lord ......... as its Minister. Lord Swinton had worked in the civil aviation department of the Air Ministry before the war and by 1944 was the Air Ministry representative attending Commonwealth Civil Aviation discussions on Post War Empire routes, held in ...... during . This was in preparation for attending the Chicago Convention to discuss development of post-war civil aviation, to be held between ....November and ..... December.
Just before the Chicargo Conference it was announced by the UK Government that Lord Swinton ...........
The four aircraft, previously registered to the Air Ministry, were now handed over to the M.... with S/Ldr ..........seconded to them as its Commander.
From June - December, the Ministry had a further ... aircraft directly registered to them: ..........
AIRCRAFT REGISTERED TO MCA by the end of 1945 =

Two de Havilland Tiger Moths, GRB and GRA, together with the Proctor, were the first aircraft to be directly registered to the MCA.
This particular photograph, courtesy Eddy Harris, taken at Croydon.

Photo: Eddy Harris

G-AGWE was one of three more Ansons to be registered to the MCA, GPB in September and the others in December.
GAGPB GAGWD, GAGWF.

Photo: Eddy Harris

1946

By January 1946 the fleet was now known as the MCA Operations Fleet and they left Croydon for a new Home at Gatwick, the Ansons had a dual purpose of Communications and the checking of Radio aids while the Tiger Moths were used for the checking of candidates requiring a commercial "B" licence.  The Austers and Proctors were used for training and communication work.
PICAO (the Provisional International Civil Aviation Organisation), the outcome of the Chicargo Conference back in 1944, was already influencing civil aviation. The Telecommunication team were taking their instruction on the calibration of equipment by following the guidelines of ICAO annex 10 (see Appendix A). These would be the Standards & Recommendations the new U.K MCA were set to adopt.
The Telecommunication side was run by a Signals Officer, Mr Ted Luff, and setup for inspection and calibration of radio aids. Although part of the MCA Operations Fleet, which itself was also becoming called the MCA Flying Wing, were already calling themselves ........
Navigational and Landing Aids (see appendix "B") requiring checking and or calibration were ..........
Additionally, there were approach aids; BABS (Blind Approach Beacon System), SBA (Standard Beam Approach), and GCA (Ground Control Approach). BABS had no glide path and SBA was principally used for approaches at civil airports at this time.
MCA FLYING WING STAFF
Pilots
Navigators
Signals Officers
Asst. Sig. Officers
Clerical                         4 (2 Staff side + 2 Tels side).
Radio Officers
The original first Anson, GAGLM, was taken off the civil register in January and returned to the RAF, however, during this year they acquired three more ansons and a Miles Gemini:
Ansons GAGWA, GAGZS, Anson GAGZT and Gemini, GAIRS.
AIRCRAFT REGISTERED TO MCA by the end of 1946 = 13

1947

ICAO, previously known as PICAO, came into force on the 4th april.
Capt B.E.E. (Basil) Marshall, later to be Commander, joined the Fleet in 1947, and three months later went on an Instrument Flying Examiner course with the RAF at Hullavington, passing with special distinction. He became .......
The number of ground stations to be checked had increased this year from 16 to 50, and the number of hours testing and flight checking them from 140 to 1,609.
FLEET WING STAFF
Staff Pilots                          INCREASE OF + 1
Navigators                         INCREASE OF + 4
Signals Officers
Asst. Sig. Officers
Clerical                                (MCA Fleet 4 + 4 CATFU)
Radio Officers
By the end of 1947 the MCA had detailed plans for the provisional control of air traffic within the U.K.
During the year the first de Havilland Dove was registered to the MCA as well as five Airspeed Consul aircraft. The Dove, G-AJLV was destined for telecommunication work and the Consuls to be used for the checking of candidates taking their Instrument Rating, which were expected to be required in the near future.
The Consul aircraft were G-AJXE through to JXH.
An additional Anson was registered, G-AGVA.
The Proctor G-AGPA crashed at Plympton, Devon and was de-registered in August. Details of the crash are unknown though it is believed there were no fatalities.
The second Gemini G-AJZL appeared.
AIRCRAFT REGISTERED TO MCA by the end of 1947 = 21

Don Barlow worked for Aviation Traders in the 1950/60's, working closely with CAFU. His wife, Stella, was a secretary with CAFU at Stansted and when they both retired in the mid 60's she passed on this photograph to me.

Not only did it have this lovely photograph of JLV the Tels Dove but also the Skyways Hermes, G-ALDS, in the background which had transported me to Cyprus in 1956 due to the Suez campaign.

Photo: Stella Barlow

One of five consuls, they were G-AJXE through to JXH,
registered to the MCA in 1947 for testing candidates taking their Instrument Rating and communication work. The new IR test probably began around 1949 when the airways were due to be introduced.

Note the Procter peeking over the Fin. If it belonged to the MCA it could have been either GLJ or GAGPA as it didn't crash until August 1947.

Photo: Eddy Harris

This is the second Gemini to be registered to the MCA, the first was G-AIRS in October 1946.
A late find has been the Gemini G-AKDD. Both JZL and KDD were registered to the ...........1947

Photo: Tony Doyle.

1948

On the 15th January 1948, the MCA implemented their plans for the provisional control of air traffic with the segregation of traffic over London, and planned the introduction of what they called the ‘...............Control Zone’.
Because of the introduction of Controlled Airspace a new instrument rating was being prepared, a new requirement being introduced under what would be the 1949 Air Navigation Regulation

POSSIBLE MOVE
In the February issue of Light Plane, it was reported that the MCA Operations Fleet were due to move to a new base at A..........................

NAME CHANGE
Up until this point the aircraft and crew were known as the MCA Operation Fleet, But on the MCA Report for 1948/9 the MCA formally used the name MCA .................. The name C..., adopted by the Tels side, which had operated within the MCA Operation Fleet, did have a problem with this name as it clashed with a similar name, ..........

AIRCRAFT REGISTERED TO MCA by the end of 1948 =

The "White Elephant"

The Ansons flown by the Fleet were mostly painted blue, but one Anson was remembered as being all white. This aircraft was G-AHIJ. It had first been registered, in April 1946, to Railway Air Services Co. Ltd., but then in August the ownership was transferred to BEA Corporation. However, BEA had it re-registered to their BEA Flying Club in the July of 1947, which may have explained the reason for this aircraft being painted white. Because only five months later it had been registered to the MCA for use by the Unit, where it was known, by Tels staff at least, as the ‘White Elephant’. In the same month, May, Anson G-AHIH was also registered to the MCA as were G-AGUD and G-AHIC.

Photo: Eddy Harris

1949

The long expected new classes of Licence were introduced in April, bringing into line the U.K.’s responsibility to comply, as a member state, with I.C.A.O. recommendations. The major change was that for the commercial Licence, replacing the old ‘B’ Licence with a graduated system that related more closely with an individuals flying experience.
Along with the new Licence, the new U.K. Instrument Rating (IR) was introduced, a qualification required of pilots wishing to fly inside the newly introduced controlled airspace (Airways and Control Zones) .........
The new Instrument Rating, when passed, would require an annual Renewal. Although the number of Examining pilots had grown to almost a score at CAFU it would not have been possible for them to have kept pace with the growing number of candidates that would later require a Renewal of their Instrument Rating. . For this reason it was necessary for the MCA to authorise certain company pilots to conduct the Renewal tests on behalf of the Ministry. These pilots would be known as Delegated Examiners (D.E.s).

PRESTWICK DETACHMENT
The MCA decentralization was probably one of the reasons why, in the early months of 1949, CAFU sent a small detachment of aircraft to ........, under the operational control of the ............Division, for the purpose of Inspection and Calibration of Navigational and Landing Aids in .........

RADIO TESTING
One of the tasks carried out by the detachment was to carry out radio experiments in VHF R/T. MCA signals technicians and members of the Mountain Rescue Unit from RAF Station ..........., were to spend a week-end on the summit of .............

ICAO APPROVES TWO AIDS
The Council of I.C.A.O. approved the ILS and GCA for international use.

MOVE TO STANSTED
The decision to move to Stansted, when it came, was not soon enough as for some months it had been a very wet period at the grass airfield at Gatwick, and staff with any outside duties needing to wear gum boots for much of the time,..........

COMMANDER
At the end of this decade, Capt. Dan ........... was still in charge of what was now known as C......

SIGNALS OFFICER
It is unclear exactly when the man in charge of the Telecommunication section was called Superintendent, but it is thought that the position of the original Signals Officer, Ted ....., had now moved to a new man, Mr. ............

CAFU STAFF
Pilots --
Navigators --
Radio Officers --
Signals Officer --
Assistant Signals Officer --
Maintenance Overseer --
Radio Mechanics 1
....... officers from Headquarters were seconded as pilots to the Unit in 1949.

AIRCRAFT REGISTERED TO MCA by the end of 1949 = .....

In October DH Dove, G-ALVS, was registered to the MCA. It was the first of five Doves intended for Instrument Rating tests, Communication and Refresher flying roles.
This photo, courtesy Eddy Harris, is in its late 1950's colour scheme and was not actually delivered until the following April.

Photo: Eddy Harris

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CAFU 1944 —1949