Thursday 17 January 2008

From The Manawatu

At last some real aircraft! Took a break from the housepainting today, and did a bit of investigating in the Manawatu. Dave Wareham sweated his guts out to push the machines into the blazing sun at Ashurst - AgHusky WAS was in the back of the hangar engineless. Nice group eh?

Over at Fielding, the Flight Training outfit was flat out training the Bangladeshies - a steady procession of Cessna's in and out again. No sign of C152 NFO this time, but OLV is finally painted and in service. That's GA200 RMU in the background, but today was the first day of work for the AirTractor RMW up at Hunterville - excellent timing!!! In the back of the maintenance hangar was PA-39 JVC (still), with corrosion control control continuing. So not yet flown here.

And finally at Palmerston North, another BK 117B-2 for Rick, JA9608 c/n 1006 to be ZK-HYX . I also noted that there seems to be less of AS 355 HYJ than last time - will it ever be completed and make its first flight?

2 comments:

  1. Neat pics of the FU24's with real engines. Good angle as well to get above those wing tips.

    Sounds like JVC has grown up since your earlier missive.

    And are there still any helicopters left in Japan after all the NZ imports over the last few years ?
    We are getting an increasing number from Sth America (and other places)nowdays.

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  2. Ooops,sorry about that Piper number Chief!
    I remember someone many moons ago explaining to me why we got so many ex-Japanese helicopters (but age has eroded the details!). It had something to do with the way the paperwork was handled in Japan meant that we were a very convenient country for them to pass out through. But that was in the days when a number came on the register briefly and were then exported. Now most of them stay!

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