TWICE FLOWN COVER

31 July 1959
and
8-16 December 2006

This cover was flown for the first time on the first scheduled jet flight from San Francisco to Sydney via Honolulu and Nadi. The cover is postmarked San Francisco on 31 July 1959 at 10.30pm and backstamped Sydney on 2 August 1959 at 3.30pm. The flight was operated by Boeing 707-138 VH-EBC City of Canberra. [Turner Ref: 5910]

This cover, which is one of only six in existence, was flown for the second time on the delivery flight of Boeing 707-138B VH-XBA (formerly VH-EBA) from Southend, UK to Sydney, Australia during the period 8-16 December 2006. The full routing of the delivery flight was Southend-Dublin-Tenerife-Bermuda-Orlando-Los Angeles-Honolulu-Nadi-Sydney. The significance of this item is explained by Norman King who carried this cover on the delivery flight of VH-XBA:

"Karen Glass, the 707 Rescue Team curator and historian that she is, took with her to Southend six (6) inaugural 707 flown covers. She graciously gave them to various Rescue Team members who were going to fly on XBA on her return to Australia. To carry them on that flight was going to be greatly symbolic. Karen, aka Green Hornet, had the idea that it would add greatly to the symbolism if a second franking at both departure and arrival were done. A few days before we left, Karen paid a visit to the Southend Post Office to put the proposal to the Postmaster. She was pleased to hear that he had been following the XBA story with keen interest, so when she suggested he might advance the official Southend stamp date by one day, so that they could be stamped the day before we left but with the actual date of departure, 8 December 2006, he readily agreed. It would not have been possible to have them franked on the real day, with a scheduled time of departure of 0700. That end achieved, with the covers having made the journey securely protected in our luggage, Robert Phillips, who was a like-minded 707 memorabilia collector and who met the aeroplane on arrival, gathered the covers and with Karen in tow drove across to the Sydney Kingsford Smith International Terminal Post Office, where the precious covers were backstamped, marking our day of arrival. As Karen had done in Southend, Robert had visited the SKSA Postmaster the day before to organise it, so nothing was left to chance. So, in the same way our 707 had been recovered, with planning and a sense of history, six of these very special twice-flown covers came to be franked this way and now form an important part of XBA collections around the country. In an aside, several bottles of Penfolds Bin 707 Cabernet Sauvignon received the same treatment (albeit more gently) and, like the flown covers, will likely never be opened."

Source: Norman King Collection

 

SUMMARY OF THE SIX INAUGURAL 707 FLOWN COVERS REFLOWN
ON THE DELIVERY FLIGHT OF VH-XBA

Route	Aircraft	Departure	Turner Ref	No. Issued
Sydney-Nadi-Honolulu-San Francisco	VH-EBC	29JUL59	5905	2
San Francisco-Honolulu-Nadi-Sydney	VH-EBC	31JUL59	5910	1
Sydney-Darwin-Singapore-Bangkok-Calcutta-Karachi-Bahrain-Cairo-Rome-London	VH-EBE	27OCT59	5930	2
London-Frankfurt-Rome-Cairo-Karachi-Calcutta-Bangkok-Singapore-Sydney	VH-EBE	29OCT59	5938	1