''Union Aéromaritime de Transport'' (UAT) was a French airline. It had its head office in the 8th arrondissement of

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...

.Translation of accident report in Rhodesia
Journal of the French Republic. Page 281. "Union Aéromaritime de Transport (U. A. T.), 5, boulevard Malesherbes, Paris (8e)"

History

The airline was founded in 1949 by a group of technicians and the shipping line Chargeurs Réunis. This was the same company which had founded the original Aéromaritime in 1934 to supplement its shipping operations around West Africa. The new postwar Aéromaritime continued under the wing of UAT until the rise of African nationalism required the creation of a more user-friendly

Air Afrique Air Afrique was a Pan-African airline, that was mainly owned by many West African countries for most of its history. It was established as the official transnational carrier for francophone West and Central Africa, because many of these cou ...

, and other local companies. On 1 May 1955, the company took over the Far East subsidiary of

Aigle Azur Aigle Azur was a French airline based and headquartered at Paris Orly Airport. The airline operated scheduled flights from France to 21 destinations across Europe, Africa, and the Middle East, with a fleet of Airbus A320 family and A330 aircr ...

, Aigle Azur Extrême-Orient, and continued running routes in that livery until 1961. The fleet included three

Boeing 307 Stratoliner The Boeing Model 307 Stratoliner (or Strato-Clipper in Pan American Airways, Pan American service, or C-75 in United States Army Air Forces, USAAF service) is an American stressed-skin four-engine low-wing Conventional landing gear, tailwheel mo ...

Operations

Early in 1950 Douglas DC-4 Skymaster scheduled services were started to

Dakar Dakar ( ; ; ) is the capital city, capital and List of cities in Senegal, largest city of Senegal. The Departments of Senegal, department of Dakar has a population of 1,278,469, and the population of the Dakar metropolitan area was at 4.0 mill ...

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and

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. In 1951 the Dakar service was extended to

Abidjan Abidjan ( , ; N'Ko script, N'ko: ߊߓߌߖߊ߲߬) is the largest city and the former capital of Ivory Coast. As of the Demographics of Ivory Coast, 2021 census, Abidjan's population was 6.3 million, which is 21.5 percent of the overall population ...

. UAT ordered the

De Havilland Comet The de Havilland DH.106 Comet is the world's first commercial jet airliner. Developed and manufactured by de Havilland in the United Kingdom, the Comet 1 prototype first flew in 1949. It features an aerodynamically clean design with four ...

1A and placed it in service on 19 February 1953 on certain routes to West Africa and by November 1953 the Comets were serving Johannesburg. In September 1954 the first of a fleet of Nord Noratlas aircraft was put into service and in 1955 the Douglas DC-6 replaced the Comets after their problems with BOAC. UAT ran services under contract to the

International Control Commission The International Control Commission (abbreviated ICC; , or CIC), was an international force established in 1954. More formally called the International Commission for Supervision and Control, the organisation was actually organised as three sep ...

, linking

Phnom Penh Phnom Penh is the Capital city, capital and List of cities and towns in Cambodia, most populous city of Cambodia. It has been the national capital since 1865 and has grown to become the nation's primate city and its political, economic, industr ...

Vientiane Vientiane (, ) is the capital city, capital and largest city of Laos. Situated on the banks of the Mekong, Mekong River at the Thailand, Thai border, it comprises the five urban districts of Vientiane Prefecture and had a population of 840,000 ...

and

Hanoi Hanoi ( ; ; ) is the Capital city, capital and List of cities in Vietnam, second-most populous city of Vietnam. The name "Hanoi" translates to "inside the river" (Hanoi is bordered by the Red River (Asia), Red and Black River (Asia), Black Riv ...

, with: F-BELU, F-BELX & F-BHHR. The February 1959 OAG shows 14 DC-6Bs a week out of Le Bourget bound for Tripoli, Johannesburg and other African cities. Millions of revenue passenger-kilometers, scheduled flights only: 304 in 1957, 468 in 1960. In 1963 Aeromaritime merged with Transports Aériens Intercontinentaux to form

Union de Transports Aériens Union de Transports Aériens (; abbreviated as UTA and sometimes known as UTA French Airlines), was a private independent airline in France that operated from 1963 until it merged with Air France in 1992. UTA was formed by the merger of Union ...

.''France's independent flag carrier'', Air Transport, Flight International, 24 June 1971, p. 945
/ref> However, the Aeromaritime name continued to be used on some aircraft until the late 1960s.

Historic fleet details

The following aircraft types were operated by UAT: *

1A *

De Havilland Heron The de Havilland DH.114 Heron is a small Propeller (aircraft), propeller-driven British airliner that first flew on 10 May 1950. It was a development of the twin-engine de Havilland Dove, with a stretched fuselage and two more Reciprocating e ...

Douglas DC-3 The Douglas DC-3 is a propeller-driven airliner manufactured by the Douglas Aircraft Company, which had a lasting effect on the airline industry in the 1930s to 1940s and World War II. It was developed as a larger, improved 14-bed sleeper ...

* Douglas DC-4 *

Douglas DC-6 The Douglas DC-6 is a piston-powered airliner and cargo aircraft built by the Douglas Aircraft Company from 1946 to 1958. Originally intended as a military transport near the end of World War II, Douglas reworked it after the war to compete ...

Douglas DC-8 The Douglas DC-8 (sometimes McDonnell Douglas DC-8) is an early long-range Narrow-body aircraft, narrow-body jetliner designed and produced by the American Douglas Aircraft Company. Work began in 1952 towards the United States Air Force's (USA ...

* Nord Noratlas.

Incidents

On 26 December 1958 a

B of UAT (F-BGTZ) crashed in

Salisbury Salisbury ( , ) is a city status in the United Kingdom, cathedral city and civil parish in Wiltshire, England with a population of 41,820, at the confluence of the rivers River Avon, Hampshire, Avon, River Nadder, Nadder and River Bourne, Wi ...

Rhodesia Rhodesia ( , ; ), officially the Republic of Rhodesia from 1970, was an unrecognised state, unrecognised state in Southern Africa that existed from 1965 to 1979. Rhodesia served as the ''de facto'' Succession of states, successor state to the ...

(now

Zimbabwe file:Zimbabwe, relief map.jpg, upright=1.22, Zimbabwe, relief map Zimbabwe, officially the Republic of Zimbabwe, is a landlocked country in Southeast Africa, between the Zambezi and Limpopo Rivers, bordered by South Africa to the south, Bots ...

). Three passengers out of a total of 70 passengers and crew died in the crash. The aircraft took off in a tropical storm and hit a downdraft. The crash site was within the airport perimeter. On 29 March 1959, a Nord Noratlas of UAT (F-BGZB) exploded in midair on a flight between Berbérati and

Bangui Bangui (; or Bangî in Sango language, Sango, formerly written Bangi in English) is the Capital (political), capital and List of cities in the Central African Republic, largest city of the Central African Republic. It was established as a Fren ...

, killing all nine onboard, including

Barthélemy Boganda Barthélemy Boganda ( – 29 March 1959) was a Central African politician and independence activist. Boganda was active prior to his country's independence, during the period when the area, part of French Equatorial Africa, was administered by ...

, the

prime minister A prime minister or chief of cabinet is the head of the cabinet and the leader of the ministers in the executive branch of government, often in a parliamentary or semi-presidential system. A prime minister is not the head of state, but r ...

of the Central African Republic autonomous territory (the future

Central African Republic The Central African Republic (CAR) is a landlocked country in Central Africa. It is bordered by Chad to Central African Republic–Chad border, the north, Sudan to Central African Republic–Sudan border, the northeast, South Sudan to Central ...

Bibliography

* R.E.G. Davies, A History of the World's Airlines, 1964, Oxford University Press, ISBN none

References

External links

1961 disestablishments Defunct airlines of France {{Europe-airline-stub