Cabo Ruivo Seaplane Base

Cabo Ruivo Seaplane Base (Portuguese: Aeroporto Marítimo de Cabo Ruivo) was an international airport for seaplanes located in the city of Lisbon, the capital of Portugal.[1] It takes its name from the Lisbon neighbourhood of Cabo Ruivo. The airport was, especially throughout the Second World War, a major gateway and escape route for intercontinental air travel.[2][3]

Cabo Ruivo Seaplane Base

Aeroporto Marítimo de Cabo Ruivo
Summary
Airport typePublic
OwnerPortuguese State
ServesLisbon, Portugal
LocationCabo Ruivo, Lisbon
Elevation AMSL0 m / 0 ft
Coordinates38°45′54.50″N 09°05′41.44″W
Map
Cabo Ruivo is located in Portugal
Cabo Ruivo
Cabo Ruivo
Location within Portugal

History

In the 1930s, the Portuguese Government decided to replace the Campo Internacional de Aterragem, at Alverca, with two new airports nearer to Lisbon's city center: today's Lisbon Portela Airport and the Cabo Ruivo Seaplane Base on the Tagus River, which handled transatlantic flights operated with seaplanes. Pan Am established its provisional seaplane base in Cabo Ruivo in 1938,[4] at the southeast edge of today's Parque das Nações. In 1942, the Portuguese Government decided to create a proper air-marine base, initially intended to be located on the same site.[5] Eventually, it was decided to build the airport structures around the Doca dos Olivais.,[6][7] two miles further up the Tagus.[8] Avenida de Berlim, a major road, was built to connect the land and sea airports.[9]

The US intercontinental airline Pan American World Airways,[10] which was a major promoter of the airport's construction, used the airport[10] as a hub for its transatlantic flights until 1945.

The first scheduled commercial passenger flight, from Port Washington, landed on 29 June 1939 on the water airstrip of the Cabo Ruivo Seaplane Base. This Atlantic flight from New York to Lisbon was operated by a Boeing 314 "Dixie Clipper" of Pan American World Airways, with 22 passengers and 11 crew members on board.[11]

During World War II, the transatlantic clippers provided an escape route for refugees from Continental Europe, taking advantage of Portugal's neutral stance in the war.[12]

With the enormous increase in the importance of terrestrial air traffic the era of seaplanes ended and the flight operations in Cabo Ruivo were discontinued in the late 1950s. The dock was redeveloped in the context of Lisbon's 1998 World Expo. Today, the dock is at the center of the Parque das Nações, where the Lisbon Oceanarium is located.[13]

Accidents and incidents

On 22 February 1943, the Yankee Clipper seaplane of Pan American World Airways was destroyed in a crash while landing on the Tagus River. 24 of the 39 occupants were killed.[14] In 1958, a Martin PBM-5 Mariner crashed on an outbound flight to Madeira, about an hour after taking off from Cabo Ruivo.[15]

References
  1. "Lisboa-Cabo Ruivo Seaplane Base profile". Aviation Safety Network.
  2. http://www.historynet.com/lisbon-harbor-of-hope-and-intrigue.htm HistoryNet entry on Lisbon's role in WW2 "The wealthiest refugees ... got tickets for the Pan American Clipper, the luxurious seaplane flying twice weekly between Lisbon and New York."
  3. Weber, Ronald (2011). The Lisbon Route: Entry and Escape in Nazi Europe Lanham, Maryland. Ivan R. Dee. p. 11. ISBN 978-1-56663-876-0.
  4. http://www.geocaching.com/geocache/GC4NERK_aeroporto-maritimo-de-cabo-ruivo?guid=34fbf35d-4a9f-4e01-a9fd-0276eb5067e7 Geocaching: Aeroporto Marítimo de Cabo Ruivo "Em 1938 ultima-se a construção da base da PAN AM em Cabo Ruivo, com edíficio de Alfândega, ponte-cais de amaragem e depósitos subterrâneos de combustível. "
  5. http://www.flightglobal.com/pdfarchive/view/1942/1942%20-%202317.html?search=lisbon Fligh Magazine, Nov 5th, 1942 "(...) authority has been given by the Portuguese Government, through the Ministry of Public Works, for the construction of a proper air-marine base, on the same site"
  6. Plan of the Airport's layout in the Doca dos Olivais.
  7. History of the Airport Archived 2015-04-11 at the Wayback Machine (PDF-file; 604 kB) from the Associação Náutica da Marina do Parque das Nações (in Portuguese)
  8. http://www.flightglobal.com/pdfarchive/view/1944/1944%20-%200068.html?search=lisbon Fligh Magazine, Jan 13th, 1944 "A new sea airport for Lisbon, estimated to cost £500,000, is to be built on a more suitable site than the present one, two miles farther up the Tagus. The projected works include a new dock with space to moor four or five aircraft, allowing room to manoeuvre them, and a modern road connecting it with the land airport opened last year at Portela. "
  9. http://www.geocaching.com/geocache/GC4NERK_aeroporto-maritimo-de-cabo-ruivo?guid=34fbf35d-4a9f-4e01-a9fd-0276eb5067e7 Geocaching: Aeroporto Marítimo de Cabo Ruivo "A Avenida Entre-os-Aeroportos (actual Avenida de Berlim) foi também construida para permitir fazer a ligação por automóvel entre os voos de longo curso de e para a América que se efectuavam por hidroavião e os voos de pequeno curso para a Europa e África com partida e destino no aeroporto terrestre."
  10. Hatton, Barry (2018). Queen of the Sea: A History of Lisbon. Hurst. p. 238. ISBN 978-1-78738-107-0.
  11. http://www.geocaching.com/geocache/GC4NERK_aeroporto-maritimo-de-cabo-ruivo?guid=34fbf35d-4a9f-4e01-a9fd-0276eb5067e7 Geocaching: Aeroporto Marítimo de Cabo Ruivo "Entre Janeiro e Junho de 1939 os aviões Boeing 314 Clipper são entregues à companhia aérea. Criadas todas as condições necessárias, o primeiro voo regular de passageiros entre a América e a Europa conclui a travessia do Atlântico no Aeroporto Marítimo de Cabo Ruivo no dia 29 de junho de 1939, tendo o avião batizado de “Dixie Clipper” saido de Port Washington no dia anterior e terminando o voo em Marselha, onde chegará com os seus 22 passageiros e 11 tripulantes após 28h e 50m de voo."
  12. http://blog.longreads.com/2015/02/10/glamorous-crossing-how-pan-am-airways-dominated-international-travel-in-the-1930s/ Glamorous Crossing: How Pan Am Airways Dominated International Travel in the 1930s "After years of planning and scheming to open Pan Am’s transatlantic routes, World War II intervened two months later. The first Clipper to arrive in New York after Nazi Germany invaded Poland carried passengers with harrowing tales of their travels. “I’ve never seen a prettier sight than the Clipper. And when I stepped aboard, I felt just as if I were home,” said Justin D. Bowersock, the aviation editor for the Kansas City Star. Unable to board the Clipper in Marseille, Bowersock and 13 others commandeered an ancient bus to take them to Biarritz on the French Atlantic coast. From there, they took a train to Lisbon, where they boarded the Clipper. The war in Europe led to the termination of the northern route at Foynes, Ireland, before being suspended entirely. The southern route, however, did booming business as refugees made their way first to Marseille and then to Lisbon."
  13. "Início".
  14. Moura-Pinto, Victor (2021-06-01). ""Naufrágio no Mar da Palha": Quando o maior avião do mundo caiu no Tejo". TVI24 (tvi24.iol.pt) (in Portuguese). TVI24. Retrieved 12 September 2021. O luxuoso Yankee Clipper, que fazia a rota Nova Iorque-Lisboa, destrói-se em segundos. [...] a morte brutal de 24 passageiros é também o começo do fim dos grandes hidroaviões.
  15. "ASN Aircraft accident Martin PBM-5 Mariner CS-THB Lisbon, Portugal". Aviation Safety Network. 9 November 1958.
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