de Havilland Heron Long-lasting Feederliner

摘要

Designed for simplicity as a 'feeder liner' to connect smaller airports with bigger hubs, the DH 114 Heron was on de Havilland's drawing boards at the same time as the smaller, twin-engined DH 104 Dove. The Heron was basically a scaled-up, four-engined partner to the Dove and, in terms of the market place, was intended to fill the capacity gap between that model and the war surplus C-47 Dakotas in widespread use.The Heron incorporated many Dove components and was to be powered by four de Havilland Gipsy Queen 30 piston engines. However, de Havitland did not think the market was ready for both new designs, so development of the Heron was put on hold until the Dove was launched successfully in 1945. Then, in 1949, the go-ahead was given to revive the shelved design. The prototype Heron 1, G-ALZL, took to the air at Hatfield on May 10, 1950, under the command of Wg Cdr Geoffrey Pike, before appearing at that year's Farnborough Air Show.