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During World War II, transatlantic air service between Britain and America was limited to Boeing 314 flying boat service between Baltimore and Foynes, which Pan American World Airways had begun in July 1939. British Overseas Airways Corporation (BOAC) also flew the route using three Boeing 314s purchased from Pan Am.[1]

The Bermuda Agreement arose in the wake of the Chicago Conference of 1944, where the United States and United Kingdom disagreed about economic control of international air transport. The US and UK had generally agreed on the first two freedoms of the air (overflight and landings for repair/refueling) but the UK and several other countries refused to accept the US position on the third, fourth and fifth freedoms regarding the handling of passenger and cargo traffic.[2] Specifically, the US sought the freedom for its carriers to determine capacity and frequencies on international routes, while the UK sought predetermined routes and an equal division of capacity between the two nations' carriers on those routes.[3] Britain had lost much of its air fleet in the course of World War II and was reluctant to place itself in full competition with the stronger American air fleet.[4]

In July 1945, the US government granted Pan Am, Trans World Airlines (TWA) and American Export Airlines (shortly thereafter acquired by American Airlines and renamed American Overseas Airlines) the right to operate transatlantic service. American began its Douglas DC-4 service between New York and Bournemouth that October.[1] Pan Am announced its own DC-4 service in October 1945 at prices less than 50% of the previous flying boat fares, which led the British government to pressure both Pan Am and the US government to back away from what Britain described as a "wholly uneconomic proposition."[5]

The US and UK governments agreed in late 1945 to meet and discuss the terms of a bilateral aviation agreement. Bermuda was chosen to host the meeting due to its location between the two countries and isolation from their respective governments. In a sign of the rapidly advancing technology of the time, the British delegation arrived in January by Boeing 314 flying boats, and departed in February by Lockheed 049 Constellation pressurized landplanes.[5]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bermuda_Agreement#Background

“British aviation writer Peter Brooks described the Lockheed Constellation as the ‘secret weapon of American air transport.’ The description was almost literally true as it was produced, if not clandestinely, certainly behind locked doors. It was the inspired result of close cooperation between Lockheed’s design staff headed by the redoubtable Kelly Johnson, and the leadership of Howard Hughes, now actively in charge of TWA. Discussions were first held in 1939. TWA ordered nine in 1940, and the ‘Model 049’, as Lockheed engineers always called it, first flew on 9 January 1943. All concerned must have known it was a winner, even if the C-54s (DC-4s) were piling up the hours across the conflict-stricken oceans.

On 19 April 1944 Hughes and TWA president Jack Frye flew the ‘Connie’ nonstop from Burbank, Lockheed’s plant location in California, to Washington, DC in three minutes less than seven hours, an air journey which normally took between 12 and 14 hours, including stops. The aircraft was immediately handed over to the Government for military use, and Howard Hughes no doubt made a considerable impression on the assembled bureaucratic multitude as he demonstrated it (illegally) in TWA’s colors”.

After World War II the Constellation came into its own as a popular, fast, civilian airliner. Aircraft already in production for the USAAF as C-69 transports were converted to civilian airliners, with TWA receiving the first on 1 October 1945. TWA’s first transatlantic proving flight departed Washington, DC, on 3 December 1945, arriving in Paris on 4 December via Gander and Shannon.

Pan American’s involvement with the Constellation came about before World War II and involved none other than Juan Trippe’s rival, Howard Hughes. According to Marylin Bender and Selig Altschul in The Chosen Instrument, during the first winter of transatlantic service with the Boeing 314, flights suffered many delays because of weather conditions and only 56% were completed. There were icy conditions in the Northeast and rough seas around the Azores. Because of the weather conditions in the Northeast, eastbound passengers were ferried south, sometimes as far south as Miami, by train or domestic carrier to pick up their transatlantic Clipper. On the westbound trip, heavy headwinds and swells at Horta in the Azores caused cancellation of many flights. Later, in the summer of 1940, Pan Am received authority to use Bolama, on the coast of Portuguese Guinea, for an alternative route during the winter months. Westbound flights originating in Lisbon flew south to Bolama and then west and north through Belem and Bermuda to its U.S. destination, adding over 4000 miles to the trip.

Pan Am desperately needed a long-range plane, a type of plane the domestic airlines had taken the lead in developing; but none existed that was capable of spanning oceans. According to Bender and Altschul, “Providence, in the person of . . . Howard Hughes bailed Trippe out on his dependence on the flying boat.” Hughes had bought a controlling interest in TWA and spurred Lockheed to build a four-engine high altitude plane for his airline. It was the Model 049 and it was a challenge to the DC-4 Douglas was building for United and American. As TWA was a domestic carrier at the time, Hughes “allowed” Trippe to enter the Lockheed program. Pan Am ordered twenty 049’s and ten long-range versions of the model in June 1940.

https://jpbtransconsulting.com/2014/01/11/the-pan-am-series-part-xxi-the-constellation/

TWA Flight 513, registration NC86513, Star of Lisbon, was a Lockheed L-049 Constellation operated by Transcontinental and Western Air on a training flight on July 11, 1946 near Reading, Pennsylvania. Electrical wiring in the baggage compartment arced, starting a fire. The smoke and intense fire created made it impossible for the pilots to maintain control of the aircraft. Of the six crewmembers aboard, five were killed. This accident is memorable for grounding all Lockheed Constellations from July 12 until August 23, 1946 when cargo fire detection equipment could be installed.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TWA_Flight_513

The day after the crash, the government grounded all 51 Lockheed Constellations, commercial versions of the Army's C-69 troop transport. Investigators found the plane caught fire when a bolt worked loose and created friction that ignited fluid leaking from a hydraulic line. Design modifications were made to hydraulic lines, engines and the fire detection system.

https://www.mcall.com/news/mc-xpm-2005-01-30-3591784-story.html

Thursday, July 11, 1946:CAA grounded the Lockheed L-049 Constellation immediately following a crash that killed four of the five crew members of a TWA plane near the airline’s training base at Reading, PA. This was the most recent in a series of accidents involving fires in the Constellation’s engines. CAA ordered modifications, mainly to the plane’s electrical system and power plants, and the 58 grounded aircraft returned to service on August 24.

http://aireform.com/resources/faa-history-pages/faa-history-1940s/

PROBABLE CAUSE: "The Board determines that the probable cause of this accident was failure of at least one of the generator lead through-stud installations in the fuselage skin of the forward baggage compartment which resulted in intense local heating due to the electrical arcing, ignition of the fuselage insulation, and creation of smoke of such density that sustained control of the aircraft became impossible. A contributing factor was the deficiency in the inspection systems which permitted defects in the aircraft to persist over a long period of time and to reach such proportions as to create a hazardous condition."

https://aviation-safety.net/database/record.php?id=19460711-0

This past week reminded the world that grounding an entire type of airliner because of safety concerns is a big deal -- and it happens very rarely.

https://edition.cnn.com/2019/03/16/business/us-airplane-groundings-history/index.html

President Donald Trump grounded all Boeing 737 Max airplanes within the U.S. Wednesday afternoon, reversing the Federal Aviation Administration’s initial support of the aircraft.

https://fortune.com/2019/03/13/trump-boeing-737-max/

President Donald Trump on Wednesday said that all of Boeing's 737 Max planes will be grounded "effective immediately," following two deadly crashes in recent months.

"We're going to be issuing an emergency order of prohibition to ground all flights of the 737 Max 8 and the 737 Max 9, and planes associated with that line," Trump said.

The FAA previously declined to follow several other countries who were grounding the planes, saying in a statement tweeted March 12 that there's "no basis to order grounding the aircraft."

The administration said the grounding will remain in effect until further investigation, which includes analyzing information from the plane's flight data recorders and cockpit voice recorders.

https://www.cnet.com/tech/tech-industry/trump-all-boeing-737-max-8-planes-are-grounded-immediately/

Facing mounting pressure, President Donald Trump said Wednesday his administration was ordering Boeing 737 Max jets grounded until more information is gathered about the crash of an Ethiopian aircraft.

It was a turnabout from the administration’s earlier position, which deemed the planes safe to fly even as dozens of other nations banned them after they were involved in two fatal disasters.

Trump said the decision to ground the Max 8 and Max 9 was made in light of new information about last week’s crash, which killed 157 people. The Federal Aviation Administration said new evidence had been collected at the sight of the crash on Wednesday, and that information – along with new satellite data – led to the grounding decision.

Trump spoke by phone Wednesday with CEO Dennis Muilenburg ahead of his grounding announcement, which came during a session on drug trafficking.

A day earlier, Muilenburg assured Trump in a separate phone call the 737 Max 8 was safe, despite the two recent crashes. Hours after that call, the FAA said it remained confident in the planes, even as governments across Europe and Asia grounded them.

https://www.cnn.com/2019/03/13/politics/donald-trump-boeing-faa/index.html

"Quarantine..."

"Q U A R A N T I N... E"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g4O-M8eFGQU

18 JUNE 1946 / PAN AM FLIGHT 100

No grounding.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_accidents_and_incidents_involving_the_Lockheed_Constellation

Dots... connect the DoTs...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_Aviation_Administration#Background

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ralph_Owen_Brewster#Congressional_career,_opposition_to_New_Deal,_and_post-war_McCarthyism

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ralph_Owen_Brewster#Opposition_to_Howard_Hughes

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julius_Klein

No general search internet record of Julius Klein Public Relations representing both Pan Am and Lufthansa.

Watch the movie... The Aviator, and play very close attention to all Brewster scenes and mentions of Brewster.

https://youtu.be/SiWlvGijfOQ

"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it"