Airline Work: “Air Transportation” 1947 Vocational Guidance Films04:33

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Published on January 29, 2018

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“Workings of a commercial airline before air travel became a mass phenomenon.”

NEW VERSION with improved video & sound:

Public domain film from the Prelinger Archive, slightly cropped to remove uneven edges, with the aspect ratio corrected, and mild video noise reduction applied.
The soundtrack was also processed with volume normalization, noise reduction, clipping reduction, and/or equalization (the resulting sound, though not perfect, is far less noisy than the original).

An airline is a company that provides air transport services for traveling passengers and freight. Airlines lease or own their aircraft with which to supply these services and may form partnerships or alliances with other airlines for mutual benefit. Generally, airline companies are recognized with an air operating certificate or license issued by a governmental aviation body.

Airlines vary from those with a single aircraft carrying mail or cargo, through full-service international airlines operating hundreds of aircraft. Airline services can be categorized as being intercontinental, intra-continental, domestic, regional, or international, and may be operated as scheduled services or charters…

Early development

Tony Jannus conducted the United States’ first scheduled commercial airline flight on 1 January 1914 for the St. Petersburg-Tampa Airboat Line. The 23-minute flight traveled between St. Petersburg, Florida and Tampa, Florida, passing some 50 feet (15 m) above Tampa Bay in Jannus’ Benoist XIV biplane flying boat. Chalk’s International Airlines began service between Miami and Bimini in the Bahamas in February 1919. Based in Ft. Lauderdale, Chalk’s claimed to be the oldest continuously operating airline in the United States until its closure in 2008.

…By the mid-1920s, the Postal Service had developed its own air mail network, based on a transcontinental backbone between New York and San Francisco… To supplant this service, they offered twelve contracts for spur routes to independent bidders. Some of the carriers that won these routes would, through time and mergers, evolve into Pan Am, Delta Air Lines, Braniff Airways, American Airlines, United Airlines (originally a division of Boeing), Trans World Airlines, Northwest Airlines, and Eastern Air Lines.

…most airlines at the time were focused on carrying bags of mail. In 1925, however, the Ford Motor Company bought out the Stout Aircraft Company and began construction of the all-metal Ford Trimotor, which became the first successful American airliner. With a 12-passenger capacity, the Trimotor made passenger service potentially profitable. Air service was seen as a supplement to rail service in the American transportation network.

At the same time, Juan Trippe began a crusade to create an air network that would link America to the world, and he achieved this goal through his airline, Pan American World Airways…

With the introduction of the Boeing 247 and Douglas DC-3 in the 1930s, the U.S. airline industry was generally profitable…

Airline personnel

The various types of airline personnel include: Flight operations personnel including flight safety personnel.

– Flight crew, responsible for the operation of the aircraft. Flight crew members include:
– Pilots (Captain and First Officer: some older aircraft also required a Flight Engineer and or a Navigator)
– Flight attendants, (led by a purser on larger aircraft)
– in-flight security personnel on some airlines (most notably El Al)
– Groundcrew, responsible for operations at airports. Ground crew members include:
– Aerospace and avionics engineers responsible for certifying the aircraft for flight and management of aircraft maintenance
– Aerospace engineers, responsible for airframe, powerplant and electrical systems maintenance
– Avionics engineers responsible for avionics and instruments maintenance
– Airframe and powerplant technicians
– Electric System technicians, responsible for maintenance of electrical systems
– Avionics technicians, responsible for maintenance of avionics
– Flight dispatchers
– Baggage handlers
– Ramp Agents
– Remote centralised weight and balancing[48]
– Gate agents
– Ticket agents
– Passenger service agents (such as airline lounge employees)
– Reservation agents, usually (but not always) at facilities outside the airport.

Airlines follow a corporate structure where each broad area of operations (such as maintenance, flight operations(including flight safety), and passenger service) is supervised by a vice president…

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