I'd like to correct a statement made by Ed Jones of Perth, Western Australia, in Mailbag, October 2008. He stated that Qantas is the longest continuously running airline in the world because KLM Royal Dutch Airlines stopped operating during World War II. It didn't! The West Indian Division of KLM operated throughout the war and even extended its network to Miami. In Europe, all flying stopped following the German invasion of The Netherlands on May 10, 1940, but on June 26, 1940, KLM started twice-weekly service between Bristol, England, and Lisbon [Lisboa], Portugal (later extended to Gibraltar), under contract to British Overseas Airways Corporation. When the BOAC charter ended in October 1945, KLM had made more than 1,600 flights and carried 18,108 passengers. The service was operated with five prewar KLM DC-3s which had escaped to England. Toward the end of the war they were replaced by three C-47 Dakotas. After the DC-3 Ibis was shot down by the Luftwaffe over the Bay of Biscay on June 1, 1943, the service was switched to night-time operations. The aircraft was shot down because the Germans believed Winston Churchill was onboard, returning from a meeting in Algiers [Algers]. He wasn't.
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