Painted in the then British European Airways pinstripe livery during construction G-APEA just missed the introduction of the Red Square livery. It flew for about a month including route proving for BEA before it appeared at the Paris Air Show and was then despatched to Canada with Vickers Vanguard titles in lieu of the airlines titles and all other BEA logo and insignia removed. At this time in it's career G-APEA was not fitted with the dorsal fin.
