The BAC Three-Eleven would have been Britain’s first widebody airliner and had the potential to put the country’s ailing aviation industry back on the map
ALL IMAGES BAE SYSTEMS UNLESS STATED
Following the merger of three prominent UK aeroplane makers in 1960 to form the British Aircraft Corporation (BAC), the government was keen to continue streamlining and overhauling the country’s aviation industry. In December 1964, a committee led by Lord Plowden was set up to thoroughly investigate its future and the Plowden Report was published a year later. In it he said the sector had no standalone future and could only survive through international collaboration, preferably with Europe.
Indeed, a few months before the findings were published, a conference had been held in London with delegates from several major cross-Channel airlines and manufacturers to encourage the sharing of ideas to create a next-generation widebody airliner to take on the growing competition from the United States.