page_title: Highland Airways Limited
section_title: Operations
hierarchical_section_title: Highland Airways Limited / Operations
caption_attribution_description: de Havilland DH-60 Gipsy Moth at Popham,Hants.,10/08/13.
context_page_description: Highland Airways Limited was established in Inverness, Scotland, by Ted Fresson in 1933 to provide passenger and freight air services between the Scottish mainland and the Northern Isles of Orkney and Shetland, and between their islands. The airline was taken over by Scottish Airways, absorbed by British European Airways in 1947.
context_section_description: Operations started on 8 May 1933 when the airline’s first airliner, the three-passenger General Aircraft Monospar ST-4 Mk.II, registered G-ACEW, flew from Longman to Kirkwall, Orkney with a stop at Wick. There is film of the event. The ST-4 was soon fitted with a pannier under the fuselage for the delivery of The Scotsman newspapers. On 3 July Fresson crashed the aircraft into a wall while landing in mist at Wideford, the airfield that the airline used near Kirkwall. A replacement, Monospar 1 G-ABVN, was hired for a few weeks while ‘CEW was repaired by General Aircraft at Croydon Airport. John Sword, of Midland & Scottish Air Ferries, also lent Fresson De Havilland Fox Moth G-ACCT and Airspeed Ferry G-ACBT for around two weeks. The field at Kirkwall's Wideford Farm had been leased by Highland for five years, and they built a hangar and installed an engineer there.
  Despite the weather, the new airline built a reputation for reliability. In the first year of operations it had achieved a 97% reliability rate, and over the following three years, this rose to 98%. Fresson organised willing islanders into teams of up to twelve men who would grab the wings of a landing aeroplane (the ground speed would be low in the high winds) and hold it down while it was tied to a heavy vehicle.
  Fresson made use of the De Havilland DH.60G Gipsy Moth G-AAWO which he had brought from his previous company, and used it for personal transport and for occasional charter flights (it could only carry one passenger). On 3 October 1933 Fresson flew a businessman from Thurso to Lerwick in 'AWO when weather forced them to land in a field next to the Kettletoft Hotel on Sanday. The field later became the landing ground for services to the island. In the same month three salesmen chartered a flight from Aberdeen to the Shetlands.
  On 7 May 1934 the network expanded by serving Aberdeen’s short-lived Seaton Aerodrome, linking it with Inverness and then on to Lerwick in the Shetlands. The first flight was conducted by Fresson in  De Havilland DH.84 Dragon G-ACIT. The use of Seaton was necessary because of intense rivalry with Eric Gandar Dower's Aberdeen Airways. Gandar Dower had recently established Aberdeen Dyce airport but had denied Fresson the use of it, forcing Highland Airways to make other arrangements to serve the city. There had been a gentleman's agreement that Highland Airways would operate to the north of Aberdeen and Aberdeen Airways would operate to the south, but with the railways dominating routes to Glasgow, Edinburgh, and onwards to London, the southern routes were unprofitable, so Gandar Dower turned his attention to the Northern Isles and their competition continued until their later merger into British Airways. Fresson moved from Seaton to a new airfield at Kintore, where he had built a new hangar, moving in on 22 May 1935.
  On 29 May 1934 Highland started the UK’s first internal airmail service, with a contract for the Inverness to Orkney route, the first flight being flown by Fresson in Dragon G-ACCE. With this, Fresson had achieved all of his objectives for the company and he celebrated by offering pleasure flights at Wideford, and a luncheon at the Kirkwall Hotel.  The mail route was soon extended to Wick and Lerwick. The airline started on-demand charter flights to the Northern Isles on 6 August. In October the same year, Orkney County Council awarded the airline a contract to carry patients between the Northern Isles and the hospital in Kirkwall, and later, to Aberdeen.
  In late 1934 Fresson tested a DH.89 Dragon Rapide, G-ACPO, for a short time. He was very impressed, but worried about its performance while using the short fields that were common on the islands. He asked De Havilland to add flaps to the wings, which they did, creating the DH.89A version which was ready by April the following year. The flaps could be added to existing aircraft, and many were converted.
  Despite all this activity, Highland Airways was not profitable, so Fresson and his board had to make the decision to seek help. A powerful investment company. Whitehal
caption: Fresson's Gipsy Moth G-AAWO active in 2013
exif: {"Image Make": "NIKON CORPORATION", "Image Model": "NIKON D3100", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image XResolution": "300", "Image YResolution": "300", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "Ver.1.01", "Image DateTime": "2013:08:10 12:15:52", "Image YCbCrPositioning": "Co-sited", "Image ExifOffset": "2306", "GPS GPSVersionID": "[2, 2, 0, 0]", "Image GPSInfo": "41370", "Image XPKeywords": "[49, 0, 48, 0, 48, 0, 56, 0, 50, 0, 48, 0, 49, 0, 51, 0, 0, 0]", "Image Padding": "[]", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "300", "Thumbnail YResolution": "300", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "41514", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "4905", "Thumbnail YCbCrPositioning": "Co-sited", "EXIF ExposureTime": "1/160", "EXIF FNumber": "63/10", "EXIF ExposureProgram": "Unidentified", "EXIF ISOSpeedRatings": "100", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0221", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2013:08:10 12:15:52", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2013:08:10 12:15:52", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "YCbCr", "EXIF CompressedBitsPerPixel": "2", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "0", "EXIF MaxApertureValue": "49/10", "EXIF MeteringMode": "Pattern", "EXIF LightSource": "Unknown", "EXIF Flash": "Flash did not fire, auto mode", "EXIF FocalLength": "120", "EXIF SubSecTime": "70", "EXIF SubSecTimeOriginal": "70", "EXIF SubSecTimeDigitized": "70", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "0100", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "2304", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "1536", "Interoperability InteroperabilityVersion": "[48, 49, 48, 48]", "EXIF InteroperabilityOffset": "41332", "EXIF SensingMethod": "One-chip color area", "EXIF FileSource": "Digital Camera", "EXIF SceneType": "Directly Photographed", "EXIF CVAPattern": "[0, 2, 0, 2, 1, 2, 0, 1]", "EXIF CustomRendered": "Normal", "EXIF ExposureMode": "Auto Exposure", "EXIF WhiteBalance": "Auto", "EXIF DigitalZoomRatio": "1", "EXIF FocalLengthIn35mmFilm": "180", "EXIF SceneCaptureType": "Standard", "EXIF GainControl": "None", "EXIF Contrast": "Normal", "EXIF Saturation": "Normal", "EXIF Sharpness": "Normal", "EXIF SubjectDistanceRange": "0", "EXIF Padding": "[]", "EXIF OffsetSchema": "4100"}