"In order to study the BLEU (Royal Air Force Blind Landing Experimental Unit) system, the F.A.A. purchased an ex American Airline DC-7, N306AA in 1960 for installation of the equipment required, (by) Sperry, New York. A comprehensive recording system was installed to permit accurate assessment of each approach and landing. The DC-7, now serialled N464, arrived at Bedford, England in October 1961 and at the time of the Press Demonstration on May 22, 1962, some 320 automatic landings had been made with this aircraft, both with leader cable and ILS touchdown guidance.
"The DC-7 installation will not be used by the FAA to validate the ability of the BLEU Equipment to land aircraft, since they consider this has already been proved. Instead, they will use it to become familiar with the concept and experiment with this single-channle automatic landing device at Atlantic City, N.J. and assess the performance of the pilot in the role of controlling and/or monitoring during approach, landing, and rollout under blind conditions, in order to define the role of automatic in the operation."
Below, a view of N464 at what was then called the National Aviation Facilities Experimental Center (NAFEC) at Atlantic City in January 1961.
