Sud Stars: Lan Chile in the 1960s

Lan Chile (nowadays LATAM Chile) has a long and impressive history befitting a country that is rather isolated from the rest of the world and at the same time long, thin and mountainous. Its operations go as far back as 1929 and was known as Lan Chile (a shortening of Línea Aérea Nacional de Chile) from 1932 onwards. Seemingly rather short of funds Lan Chile soldiered on with piston liners well into the 1960s and when their first jets arrived they were not the expected 707s or DC-8s.

Lan Chile Sud Aviation Caravelle VI-R CC-CCP Aeroclassics 1:400 Scale Model Airliner

Lan's initial equipment was a selection of French and German types but the Second World War interrupted spares for these and the airline re-equipped with more standard Lockheed Electra 10s and Douglas DC-3s.

A Lan DC-3. This aircraft actually crashed in 1961 killing all 24 aboard in Chile's worst air disaster. It wasn't rediscovered until 2015. Photo from Wikipedia

It wasn't until postwar that it joined IATA and started international operations and during the 1950s it really spread its wings, with the purchase of a trio of Douglas DC-6Bs in 1955 being a turning point. Five DC-6s eventually joined the fleet and were originally registered as CC-CLDB/D/E/F and G. One of the new DC-6Bs enabled Lan Chile to undertake a global first by flying over the icebound continent of Antarctica on December 22, 1956. Although this gained the airline much kudos it was longer haul flights to more populous places that were desired.

A Lan DC-6

Finally in April 1958 Lan Chile gained permission to fly to the United States, although the DC-6 couldn't make it in one flight. The routing was an extension of the Santiago-Lima route to Guayaquil, Panama City and then Miami beyond. The service began in August and flight 151 operated twice weekly. The return leg left on Thursdays and Sundays arriving in Santiago the day afterwards and then continuing on to Buenos Aires and Montevideo.

During 1959 the registration structure changed in Chile and the DC-6 fleet were re-registered with more familiar CC prefixed regos in the sequence CC-CCE-J (F was missing). Lan Chile was a surprisingly late operator of pure jet aircraft giving the DC-6s six years of operation on the US service before they were usurped. When they were it was not by the Boeing 707 or Douglas DC-8 that you might have expected but instead by the short range French Sud-Aviation Caravelle! Lan Chile ordered three aircraft in July 1963 and the first Caravelle VI-R was delivered on March 30, 1964.

It was not unheard of for Caravelles to operate long flights (VARIG also did it) but it certainly must have been a different kind of experience. Nonetheless Lan Chile put the type into service on the 'LAN-jet Royal Blue Caravelle Service' in April. The routing remained unchanged as did the frequency. Impressively the Caravelle could do the multi-leg journey in 8 hours less than a DC-6! The Caravelles were also used on domestic Chilean services to Punta Arenas, Puerto Montt and Antofagasta, alongside the DC-6s.

Quite why Lan Chile chose the Caravelle is uncertain but perhaps the loads simply didn't justify the larger aircraft at the time. It is also likely Lan's decision was influenced by Aerolineas Argentinas' use of Caravelles on services to santiago from Buenos Aires.

The Caravelle delivery scheme had an Air France-esque tail design. here's CC-CCP in the first scheme.

Lan Chile's Caravelles

The DC-6s would continue on domestic services, replacing Convair 340s, until the arrival of new HS.748s from 1967 and still operated the route to Easter Island until February 28, 1970 when a Boeing 707 replaced them there too. The Boeing product was certainly more suitable for long haul expansion and Lan acquired their first, second hand from Lufthansa, on April 5, 1967. This aircraft was a 144 passenger 707-330B that had only been delivered new to Lufthansa, as D-ABUC, in October 1965. It was apparently part of a deal that gave Lufthansa traffic rights on the Lima-Santiago route.

As CC-CEA the 707 was able to inaugurate a new twice weekly New York route (routing Buenos Aires-Santiago-Lima-JFK) on April 15, 1967. The paucity of 707s meant the Caravelles continued on the Miami service, which was in fact increased to 4 times weekly. Lan Chile upgraded its fleet substantially in February 1968 when the first of four new Boeing 727-116s entered service. The trijets complemented rather than replaced the Caravelles, which remained in service operating the domestic routes up and down the spine of Chile into the 1970s. They were finally withdrawn in August 1975 and all three moved to Aerotal Aerolineas Territoriales De Colombia.

Lan Chile 707-330B CC-CEA at JFK in November 1971. Photo by JFCiesla from Flickr

Prior to that one of the Caravelles was hijacked on February 6, 1970 when two pistol armed men seized the plane en-route to Santiago from Puerto Montt. When the aircraft landed in Santiago the hijackers let 7 adults and 5 children off and ordered the aircraft to be refuelled. They were overpowered by police dressed as mechanics soon afterwards. This hijacking was symptomatic of stormclouds gathering above Chile's political landscape. The next decade would bring severe turbulence to Chile but its national airline would continue to grow and thrive.

References

Caravelle Operations in the 1960s in South America. Utopia blogspot
Hijacking February 6, 1970. Aviation Safety Network
Lan Chile. Company Histories.com
Lost Schemes: #222 LAN-Chile 757-2Q8 (1996-97). Airliner Cafe