Word: britanniae
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Last year he persuaded the Queen to let him take the royal yacht Britannia on a four-month tour of the Antarctic and the lesser British island possessions in the Indian Ocean. This was the separation that later set off the rumors in the U.S. press of a royal rift. Elizabeth's subjects, however, were more sensible. Australians were charmed when he talked to wharf laborers, called in small groups of representative citizens for cocktails and dinner and quizzed them on Commonwealth affairs. New Zealanders remember him fondly at a lunch in Christchurch, breaking into the speeches...
When Britain first advertised the Bristol Britannia for delivery in early 1957, U.S. airmen thought they might have something to worry about. Until Boeing and Douglas pure jetliners were ready to fly in 1959, British Overseas Airways Corp.'s big (93 passengers), fast (385 m.p.h.) turboprop plane seemed a likely cream-skimmer in the lush transatlantic trade. But once again Britain's state-dominated aircraft industry managed to pluck defeat from victory. Nine months late, Bristol last week finally rolled out the first of 18 Britannia 312s for BOAC amid a chorus of complaints about the plane...
Just as angry was BOAC's Managing Director Basil Smallpeice, who let Bristol have it on the chin. When Bristol's short-range Britannia 102s finally went into service from London to Johannesburg last February, said Smallpeice, they were 19 months late, which held down BOAC's net profit in fiscal 1956 to $850,000. Yet the 102's tendency to ice at high altitudes has still not been licked. During 1956, Bristol tried to correct the icing, which caused dangerous flameouts. Finally, it devised a still not entirely satisfactory solution: a platinum glow plug "pilot...
...part, Bristol was badly hampered by the red tape of the government's Transport Ministry, which had to approve new standards for the government-owned airline's new plane, and in addition ordered exhaustive fatigue tests on the Britannia after the crashes of the Comet jetliner. And BOAC itself made frequent design changes during the long months...
...evening the ship's band, as usual, played "Rule, Britannia! Britannia, rule the waves!" First-class passengers invented a cocktail: "Reina on the Rocks." Some of them began going ashore to sightsee, while others began flying to Britain at the expense of the Pacific Steam Navigation Co. When third-class passengers also asked for air passage, they were told to go ahead-at their own expense...