- New York Airways
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- This article discusses the helicopter airline, which should not be confused with the 1980s startup airline, New York Air.
New York Airways 
IATA ICAO Callsign Founded 1949 Ceased operations 1979 Focus cities New York City Destinations Headquarters LaGuardia Airport
Flushing, Queens, New York City, New York
Taken at the Downtown Manhattan/Wall St. Heliport, N6676D is hooked to a Ford Mustang for publicity stunt. The Mustang was flown around Manhattan by the Vertol 107-II.
N6682D comes in to land atop the Pan Am building in Coogan's Bluff starring Clint Eastwood
Interior shot of N6682D as it prepares to depart the Pan Am Building in September, 1967.New York Airways was a helicopter airline in the New York City area. Founded in 1949 as a mail and cargo carrier, on July 9, 1953 it became the first scheduled helicopter airline to carry passengers in the United States[1]. Its headquarters were at LaGuardia Airport.[2]
Contents
History
Passenger flights started with Sikorsky S-55 military helicopters, but Sikorsky and the Boeing Company soon began designing civil helicopters. New York Airways added three S-58s to its five S-55s in 1956; in 1958 the Boeing Vertol V-44, a civil version of the Piasecki H-21 took over. In 1962 they changed to the Boeing Vertol 107-II Turbocopter, and later the Sikorsky S-61.
In February 1955 the one way fare from LaGuardia to Idlewild was $4.50. The ship was a Sikorsky H-19, N418A. The trip took ten minutes and their phone number was DEfender 5-6600.
The first scheduled passenger flights to Manhattan arrived in December 1956 at the new heliport west of the West Side Highway at 30th St. The downtown heliport on East River Pier 6 opened in 1960 and New York Airways moved all its Manhattan flights down there around December 1960.
Scheduled flights to the top of the Pan Am Building began in December 1965; they ended in 1968, then resumed for a few months in 1977. In April 1966 23 flights a day flew nonstop to Pan Am's terminal at JFK, scheduled 10 minutes; passengers could check in at the Pan Am Building 40 minutes before their scheduled departure out of JFK. The downtown heliport had 13 flights a day to Newark, 5 nonstops to TWA's terminal at JFK and 12 to LGA, all of which continued to JFK. (Downtown had no weekend flights.)
Soon after Pan Am Building flights resumed the March 1977 OAG showed 48 weekday S-61 departures from there: 12 to EWR, 14 to LGA then JFK, and 22 nonstops to JFK.
New York Airways employed the first African American as an airline pilot. Perry H. Young made his historic first flight on February 5, 1957. Young had previously made history as the first African American flight instructor for the United States Army Air Corps.[3]
At its peak the airline partnered with 24 international and domestic airlines. At various times it served:
- John F. Kennedy International Airport
- LaGuardia Airport
- Newark Airport
- West 30th St, Manhattan
- "Wall Street" Heliport 40°42′05″N 74°00′33″W / 40.7015°N 74.0092°W
- Stamford, Connecticut Heliport
- Teterboro Airport
- Westchester County Airport
- downtown Trenton
- New Brunswick 40°28′01″N 74°28′52″W / 40.467°N 74.481°W
- Hadley Airport 40°33′18″N 74°25′59″W / 40.555°N 74.433°W
- Morristown Municipal Airport
For some months in 1969 the OAG showed some inter-airport flights to be Twin Otters while others continued to be Vertols. Fuel prices soared after the 1973 energy crisis damaging profitability. The airline could not recover after the 1977 Pan Am Building accident and the 1979 energy crisis, and New York Airways filed for bankruptcy on May 18, 1979.
Passengers boarded, in thousands, scheduled flights only: 68 in 1957, 144 in 1960, 537 in 1967, 268 in 1970.
Currently all surviving New York Airways Boeing Vertol 107s are operated by Columbia Helicopters:
- N6672D
- N6674D
- N6675D
- N6676D
- N6682D
- N107PA (Operated under contract to Pan Am)
- N108PA (Operated under contract to Pan Am)
N6674D is the highest flying time helicopter in the world, having surpassed 70,000 flight hours since its construction in 1962.[4]
N6682D is featured in the 1968 film Coogan's Bluff starring Clint Eastwood taking off from the roof of the Pan Am Building. N108PA is the helicopter arriving with Eastwood.
N6676D is shown taking off from the Downtown Manhattan/Wall St. Heliport in the last of the Secret Agent 077 trilogy of films, 1966's Special Mission Lady Chaplin.
Accidents
On October 14, 1963 New York Airways Flight 600 (a Boeing-Vertol 107 registered N6673D) crashed shortly after takeoff from Idlewild Airport (now JFK) en route to Newark via Wall Street. All three passengers and all three crew members died. The accident was blamed on a mechanical failure due to contaminated lubricants.[5]
On May 16, 1977, the landing gear failed on a Sikorsky S-61 while it was taking on passengers on the roof of the Pan Am Building. The aircraft rolled onto its side. Its spinning rotor blades killed four passengers waiting to board (including movie director Michael Findlay) and injured a fifth. Parts of a broken blade fell into the streets below, killing one pedestrian and injuring another. The accident precipitated the closure of the heliport for good.[6]
See also
External links
References
- ^ No other helicopter airlines in the world were carrying passengers at that time, but BEA had scheduled passenger flights on S-51s starting in 1950.
- ^ "World Airline Directory." Flight International. May 3, 1957. 608.
- ^ LeDuff, Charlie (November 19, 1998). "Perry H. Young Jr., 79, Pioneering Pilot, Dies". The New York Times. http://www.nytimes.com/1998/11/19/nyregion/perry-h-young-jr-79-pioneering-pilot-dies.html. Retrieved 2010-03-27.
- ^ Sweet, Dan. "Tandem Notes" (PDF). Boeing Helicopter. http://www.boeing.com/rotorcraft/military/ch47d/tandemnotes/tnv4n3.pdf.
- ^ "Aircraft Accident Report - New York Airways, inc., Boeing-Vertol 107-II, N6673D, New York International Airport, Jamaica, New York October 14, 1963" (.pdf). National Transportation and Safety Board. June 24, 1964. http://www.avsaf.org/reports/US/1963.10.14_NewYorkAirways_Boeing-Vertol107-II.pdf. Retrieved 2007-02-09.[dead link]
- ^ "Aircraft Accident Report - New York Airways, inc., Sikorsky S-61L, N619PA Pan Am Building Heliport, New York, New York May 16, 1977" (.pdf). National Transportation and Safety Board. October 13, 1977. http://www.airdisaster.com/reports/ntsb/AAR77-09.pdf. Retrieved 2007-02-09.
- Airline History: New York Airways
- New York Airways flyer at Airchive.com
Categories:- Defunct airlines of the United States
- Airlines established in 1949
- Helicopter airlines
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