100 years of airmail service in Norway
Exactly 100 years ago, on 18 August 1920, as Camille Allaz (The History of Air Cargo and Airmail) says, or two or three days earlier according to other sources, Det Norske Luftfartrederi (DNL) launched Norway’s first regular airmail service.
With Supermarine Channel and Friedrichshafen FF.49 seaplanes the company operated a regular service along the Norwegian coast on the Bergen-Haugesund-Stavanger route with a reliability of 94%. Only one aircraft crashed (without injury to crew or passengers) after an apparently drunk passenger had threatened the pilot.
Since only a few customers were prepared to pay a 40 öre air surcharge for a distance of 200 km, the venture was not an economic success, so that the company decided to cancel the service already on 15 October of the same year. More significant than the carriage of a total of 64 passengers were the mail-only flights: at the end, the aircraft carried around 300 letters per flight.
DNL, a member of the International Air Traffic Association, Iata’s predecessor, was liquidated in December 1920. (ah)