1961 - Transportation

Transportation

The S.S. Canberra launched for the Cunard Line is a 44,807-ton passenger liner measuring 818.5 feet in length.

A Sabena passenger plane crashes outside Brussels February 15, killing 72 on board (including the U.S. figure-skating team) plus a farmer on the ground.

The YHC-1B Chinook helicopter introduced by Boeing Aircraft is a medium-lift craft with tandem rotors (see politics [Piasecki], 1949). Boeing acquired the Philadelphia-based Vertol Co. last year, U.S. troops will use the Chinook in combat beginning in 1965, and by 1968 Chinooks will have logged 161,000 hours of flying time, carrying 22.4 million people and 1.3 million tons of cargo (see politics, 1973).

London gets its first minicabs March 6 as Carline of Wimbledon begins to supplement the city's large, comfortable Austin taxicabs. Automotive engineer John Cooper, 37, has created the highly maneuverable sedan, basing it on a drawing sketched on the back of a cigarette pack by British Motor Corp. boss Sir Alec Issigonis, and a souped-up version gains quick popularity as a private car for "Swinging London."

Britain's 65-year-old Leyland Motors Ltd. acquires the 58-year-old company that has made Triumph motorcars since 1923 and reenters the motorcar business (see Rover, 1966).

The Department of Justice indicts General Motors for having forced most U.S. railroads to buy locomotives made by GM's Electro-Motive Division or risk having GM cars shipped by other carriers. The criminal proceedings will be dropped in December 1964.

Former General Motors president Charles E. ("Engine Charlie") Wilson dies at Norwood, La., September 26 at age 71.

The United States has 11.7 million trucks, up from 8.62 million in 1951.