Predictions of how technology will change the way we live usually appear in hindsight to be embarrassingly wide of the mark. Where are those flying cars and jet packs? The internet revolution took the techno-seers by surprise.
The first look by The World Today, in its inaugural edition of July 1945, into the future of aviation was surprisingly astute as regards how wartime technological advances would change the world, even if the commercial reality has turned out very differently today.
Much of Europe was in ruins, but the foundations of a new era of international flight were well laid during the war, the arrival of the jet engine, large numbers of personnel trained in flying and aircraft design and a global network of runways where there were ‘formerly only deserts or coral islands’.
