Air Orient: 1931

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On January 17, 1931, Air Orient, inaugurates the Marseille-Saigon line, It takes 10 days to go from Marseille to Saigon with 18 stopovers:  Marseille - Naples - Corfu - Athens - Castellorizo - Beirut - Damascus - Baghdad - Bouchir - Djask - Karachi - Jodhpur - Allahabad - Calcutta - Akyab - Rangoon - Bangkok - Saigon.

The Fortnightly Line uses seaplanes and planes:

- Marseille-Marignane - Beirut, in 3 days, CAMS 53 seaplane

- Beirut - Damascus by car one hour after the arrival of the plane,

  duration 2 hours.

- Damascus - Karachi in 2 days, Farman F30 trimotors

- Karachi - Bangkok in 3 days, Fokker F VII trimotors

- Bangkok - Saigon in 1 day, CAMS 53 seaplane.

1932 – 1940: Air Orient to Air France_cc781905-5cde -3194-bb3b-136bad5cf58d_

(Reference: https://www.entreprises-coloniales.fr/inde-indochine/Air_France-Indochine.pdf . Pieces chosen with the authorization of the Webmaster: Mr Alain Léger whom I thank.)

Installation of the Paris-Saigon line

The first Fokker developed by Marsot was delivered to Paris to inaugurate the first regular postal journey between France and the Far East; the pilot was André Launay to Damascus, while Noguès carried out a final inspection of the bases in the Mediterranean. In Damascus, Noguès took over the controls and landed in Saigon on January 27, 1932, from where he left on February 4 in the direction of Paris. In Beirut, the mailbags were transferred to the seaplane which landed on the 14th in Marseilles. The Noguès line operated from one end to the other: 11,000 km and 10 flight days . Damascus, halfway between France and the Far East, was equipped as a repair centre. A TSF station was installed which made it possible to follow minute by minute the movement of the apparatuses on all the line.

This line, a new and modern route to India, crossed 8 rivers, 11 seas, 13 mountain ranges, 3 deserts and was open twice a month to customers. On May 5, 1932, the frequency became weekly.

Birth of Air France

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On August 30, 1933, Air Orient had merged with the other

French air transport companies, to found Air France.

The president was Ernest Roume,

and Maurice Noguès, deputy general manager. Until

the Second World War, the line which now bears

the line name Maurice-Noguès, kept the figuration

that he had given him: a mixed route from Marseille to Bangkok

with two connections: one to Saigon the other to Hanoi.

The stopovers were then as follows: Naples, Corfu, Athens, Castellorizo (Dodecanese), Tripoli (from Syria), Damascus, Baghdad, Bouchir, Djask, Karachi, Jodhpur, Allahabad, Calcutta, Akyab, Rangoon, Bangkok, Saigon or Hanoi.

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On the first air-sea part of the route (Marseille-Tripoli), after the Météore and CAMS seaplanes, the Lioré and Olivier H 242 hydroplanes were put into service, carrying fifteen passengers.

On the second land part, the Damascus-Baghdad section was operated with Breguet Berline (6 passengers) then, until 1933, by Farman 303 trimotors or Fokker VII. Then comes 1934. Maurice Noguès, creator of one of the most remarkable international lines in the world, holder of more than 6,000 flight hours, director of operations of the Air France company, disappears aboard the Emeraude, on January 15 1934, in Corbigny. Although this accident was due to exceptional atmospheric circumstances, significant modifications will be made to the Dewoitine 332 piloted by André Launay that day. This disaster was to delay for several years the entry into service of the new tri-engine on which Air Orient, then Air France had based so much hope.

Opening of the France-Hanoi line

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The operation of the Hanoi line took place on February 1, 1935, on the Bangkok, Vientiane, Hanoi route. This opening was very well received but the very short transit time between the arrival and the departure of the flight surprised the officials and the public.

At the beginning of 1935, the opening of the Bangkok-Vientiane-Hanoi section brought our Far Eastern airline to the gates of China and made the solution of transporting Chinese mail to and from Europe more urgent. .     

The vertigo of speed the new devices

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At the end of 1936, the Potez 62 appeared and it slightly preceded the famous Dewoitine 338 trimotor, the first long-haul aircraft which, from the end of 1937, took over on the land route. The duration of the Marseille-Saigon flight was reduced to 5 and a half days.

On July 21, 1938, the flight from Bangkok to Hanoi via Vientiane was cancelled. The speed of the aircraft now made it possible, while saving time, to establish a direct Bangkok-Saigon-Hanoi connection.

At the same time, Air France adopted a new Mediterranean-South route, departing from Marseille via Tunis, Tripoli (Libya), Benghazi, Alexandria, Cairo, Damascus. And the war came when Air France was planning to launch a daily service to the Far East in a Dewoitine 338 equipped with couchettes.

Indochinese railway infrastructure (Ref: wikipedia)

Under the mandate of Paul Doumer, major works were launched to develop railway equipment, both as an instrument of imperialist penetration into China, but also to open up the economies of Indochina. In 1942, Indochina had 2,767 kilometers of railways. Most of the lines are the work of the Yunnan Railway Company. Its main achievement is the Transindochinois, opened in successive sections between 1905 and 1936. Once completed, this line makes it possible to travel by train from Saigon to southern China, via Hué and Hanoi. In Cambodia, 500 kilometers of railway linked Phnom Penh and Battambang in 1932. Laos, on the other hand, is lagging behind, and still had no railways in the 1930s.

Aeronautics is also developing in Indochina: the first plane arrives in 1910, then a decree of 1917 prescribes the creation of an aviation squadron in Tonkin. Air links between Hanoi and Saigon are provided from January 1921.