1962 NEW YORK AIRWAYS HELICOPTER SERVICE TO MANHATTAN PROMOTIONAL FILM 34204
Vložit
- čas přidán 4. 09. 2024
- This is a rare promotional film for New York Airways, "THE SKYLINE ROUTE" that dates to 1962 and features the Boeing Vertol 107 helicopter. At this time NYA offered service to LaGuardia and Idlewild Airport. The film includes rare footage of flight operations as well as images of 1960s New York with its traffic jams, which was the primary selling feature for the Skyline Route service. At 10:09, a future service from the Pan Am building's roof heliport is discussed -- a feature that would eventually prove the airline's undoing when there was a major accident atop the skyscraper (read below).
NYA was a helicopter airline in the New York City area. It was 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. Its headquarters were at LaGuardia Airport.
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 passenger flights down there around December 1960.
Due to route restrictions on the single-engine Vertol 44, nonstop flights from Manhattan to Idlewild didn't begin until the twin-engine 107 arrived. 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. On May 16, 1977, the landing gear failed on a Sikorsky S-61L (N619PA) 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 permanent closure of the heliport.
The airline could not recover after the 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.
We encourage viewers to add comments and, especially, to provide additional information about our videos by adding a comment! See something interesting? Tell people what it is and what they can see by writing something for example: "01:00:12:00 -- President Roosevelt is seen meeting with Winston Churchill at the Quebec Conference."
This film is part of the Periscope Film LLC archive, one of the largest historic military, transportation, and aviation stock footage collections in the USA. Entirely film backed, this material is available for licensing in 24p HD, 2k and 4k. For more information visit www.PeriscopeFi...
I worked on the cooling tower of the Pan Am building in 1982. We would eat lunch on what was the heliport which took up half of the rooftop. The cooling tower the other half. The "control tower" was only a few feet above the pad of the heliport (it was built into it) and there was still damage to the facade where one of the rotor blades hit it when the landing gear broke. There was also scrapes on the concrete pad itself. All probably still there.
One of the coolest parts was we could simply open the door and walk down the escalator to the waiting area where there was a beautiful bar and tables. All closed at the time. I thought, how wonderful it must have been to be affluent in the 50's and 60's. The future was bright and everything was Go Go Go !
What the hell happened ?
Interesting story thanks for sharing.
Flew NYA KV-107 from JFK to Teterboro, NJ via Pan Am Building in '66 coming back from family vacation to Puerto Rico (via Trans-Caribbean Airlines) - what an experience!
The one dislike is a taxi driver.
The reason the accident on the pan am heliport occurred was because the right side landing gear fractured from fatigue.
The Pan Am building, home of Pan Am, and the Chrysler building, home to Chrysler.
How the mighty have fallen
*I bet the cost is astronomical, but if I could financially swing it,*
*that'd be my number one route into the city, no question!*
*And look at the way the people are dressed, their comportment.*
*When Civilization was still intact ....*
🙂👍🏻
I was 6 years old in '62 and I remember how it was. Oh how far we have fallen.
$9.00 fare they said. Not so much, even back then.
Why is it the past seems so futuristic?
Half the country wasn’t broke and living paycheck to paycheck
I grew up in Bayonne, these choppers flew over our house all the time on their way into the city.
Favorite part is at 12:40 lady in pearls and white gloves. Can you imagine seeing a woman wearing white gloves on an airline today!?
That's the way it was back then. My parents dressed us up to go watch the planes at Newark Airport around this time. And, everywhere else we went other than stores, etc. Dressed up to go to the Circus, dressed up to go to The Museum of Natural History. Dressed up to pick up my Grandma at the TWA terminal around 1965/66. It was the style around NYC until the late 60s!!!
@@JeffFrmJoisey wasn't it grand ! I was at those same places with my parents at that time. I'll never forget the first jet airliner we saw at Newark Airport. My mother pointed it out and yelled "hey look there's one of those new jets" !
Can you imagine telling some kid how excited we were to see a jet ?
@@thejerseyj9422 I can! I lived near LaGuardia Airport from 1957 til 1961 when we lived in Woodside Queens. I was a little boy at that time.
I like the Lower Manhattan skyline lit up at the end. Never seen a good nighttime flyby of 60s downtown with the lights all on.
Also the Singer Building has that small blinking light at the top: another thing I've never noticed before.
Should never have touched the Singer Building
Damn! The PanAm building under construction...
La Guardia Airport is only 5 miles from Midtown Manhattan. I am a New Yorker who grew up in NYC during the Mad Men era.
Remember that Pan Am had right on Park Avenue a teleport on top of the Pan Am building and it would take you to the airport we have so much class in New York
I find it hard to believe the subject of a connecting flight wouldn't have come up if Mr. Foxx was rushing to buy a helicopter ticket for another airport. lol
The boy sitting by the window looks a lot like Tommy Norden (Bud on the TV show Flipper).
*... and the water he's flying over is so dirty,*
*it looks like the kind of place Flipper would go to score heroin. lol*
My friend and I rated Flipper our favorite show.
Ironically in the pilot Bud doesn't even exist. It was only Sandy, Flipper and of course, Ranger Rick's. Who was I thought about the coolest guy on TV.
GREAT!...
Hard to imagine your "connecting" flight taking you to a completely different airport than the one where your "connection" was but I remember a ten minute ride on a Vertol 107 from Oakland to San Francisco back in the early 70's
I took it one night from EWR to LGA with a Manhattan stop. It was a beautiful flight, especially at night.
This film is crying out for restoration and preservation
That's what we've done -- it's been scanned in 4k and stored in our digital library.
I’ve flown in a Navy H46. There is no such thing as airvents reading lights or the ability to have a normal conversation without hearing protection.
What is a turban?
Philip George They're worn by Indian helicopter pilots.
Turbine.
Was that helicopter lost? How do you pass the Statue of Liberty on the flights between LaGuardia and Idlewild (JFK)? Was he lost or just trying to accumulate more air hours?
David Null I think it's called 'artistic licence.'
Those were the flights to Newark airport
@@heli-crewhgs5285 you hit the nail on the head. Flying north past the Empire State Building on the way from Newark to Idlewild. 😉
12:53 BUTTER???
This a documentary about trumps childhood, right?