Category: Airlines Of Australasia

Ansett's Last Props: The F50 Euroglider

28/5/2017

The Fokker F27 had a long and distinguished career in Australia with the government airline, Trans Australia Airlines, and its private competitor Ansett. With the F27s reaching the end of their lives in the mid-1980s Ansett was casting around for a replacement and not surprisingly its modernised sister the Fokker 50 fitted the bill. Unfortunately the F50s were overtaken by events at Ansett and it wouldn't really be until they went out west that they found their raison d’être.

2 Comments

Pacific Rockets: Fijian One-Elevens

12/4/2017

7 Comments

Air Pacific was one of only two customers in the Oceania region to equip itself with Britain's BAC One-Eleven. Though the One-Eleven was a middling success for a declining British civil aviation industry, by the late-1960s, despite heavy pressure from the British government, it could not compete effectively with the new Douglas DC-9 and Boeing 737-200 on a level playing field. Even so Fiji's One-Elevens were some of the last built and being specialist series 475s helped Air Pacific reach its often primitively equipped island destinations.

7 Comments

Kiwi Budgies Pt1: Mount Cook HS 748s

22/3/2017

2 Comments

Mount Cook Airlines was started by Henry "Harry" Rodolph Wigley, a former RNZAF WW2 fighter pilot and Wing Commander, who postwar built up his father's Mount Cook Group and began ski-plane operations in 1955 in the South Island of New Zealand. Little did they expect that their venture would grow into New Zealand's 3rd airline and continue its pioneering services into the 2010s. The aircraft that really put Mount Cook on the map, however was the sturdy HS 748.

2 Comments

Godwits to Korus: 737-200s in New Zealand

30/12/2016

11 Comments

The Boeing 737 has had a long and fruitful service in New Zealand especially in the guise of the series 200, which New Zealand became a very early home for. Operations stretched from the late 1960s into the early 2000s; first with National Airways Corporation and subsequently with Air New Zealand. The Fat Albert was the first pure jet on the NZ domestic scene and whether wearing a Godwit or the Koru proved its value to generations of kiwis.

11 Comments

Stability First: Ansett and TAA's Cross-leased DC-6s

2/12/2016

3 Comments

The DC-6B is widely seen to be the best piston engined aircraft of the 1950s, bringing a reliability not seen in the later DC-7 and efficiencies that the competing Constellations couldn't match. However on shorter routes it was no match for the turboprop Viscount and by the end of the decade it was obsolete in comparison to the larger turboprops and early jets. So just how was it that TAA became a new DC-6 operator in the 1960s?

3 Comments

From BCPA to TEAL: DC-6s over the Pacific

5/10/2016

5 Comments

Aviation in New Zealand was a late bloomer and it wasn't until just before WW2 that the country was connected to the world by air travel. TEAL was a rather complicated beast but it prospered despite its joint ownership and benefitted from the less fortunate BCPA to be able to move beyond flying boats and into the era of land planes in the Pacific.

5 Comments

Ansett's 1980s Re-equipment Binge

17/2/2016

1 Comment

Ansett entered the 1980s under new ownership and with a renewed sense of aggressive competition between it and TAA. Despite better cost control it also went on an aircraft buying binge, re-equipping its entire fleet with new Boeings and Airbuses. Though to a degree a necessity the over-ambitious and poorly thought through policy became a factor in the airline's eventual collapse.

1 Comment

Last Minute Korus: NZ's 737-300s

11/2/2016

0 Comments

By the late 1990s the Boeing 737-300 was not new technology and had been superseded in Boeing's catalogue by the Next Generation 737-700 and 800. Air New Zealand has always had an eye for value and did not feel that it needed to acquire the very latest models when cheaper alternatives were available. Boeing itself has typically employed a soft changeover from aircraft sub-types meaning that there had previously been 737-200s newer than the first series 300s and 747-300s newer than the first series 400s. That gave Air New Zealand an opportunity to take the last 737-300s from the production line, probably at a discount.

0 Comments

TAA Short Haul T-Jets Pt2: Look of the 70s

21/11/2015

1 Comment

TAA's DC-9s would prove to be a great success but their introduction wasn't without issue. It was nothing to do with the airframe however but to do with the modern two-man cockpit and industrial relations. Once that was out of the way the nines would form the largest component of the TAA fleet throughout the 1970s and keep on keeping on until after TAA had morphed into Australian Airlines.

1 Comment

TAA Short Haul T-Jets Pt1: DC-9s or One-Elevens

20/11/2015

1 Comment

The 1960s was a boom time for the Australian domestic carriers which found they couldn't re-equip their fleets fast enough with new jets. The 727 was an early decision but it was the numerically superior short-haul jet requirement which would cost more money. As with all Australian purchasing decisions the process was complicated by the unique two airline policy, however by mid-1967 TAA had its new jet.

1 Comment

First Domestic Widebodies in Oz: TAA's Airbus Indigestion

30/10/2015

4 Comments

Contrary to expectations the nationalised Trans-Australia Airlines was always the pacesetter, compared to Ansett, in the government managed duopoly of Australian domestic routes. Ansett itself tended to be more content with the status quo. This was again the case with widebodies, though in this case being on the bleeding edge caused TAA some major problems.

4 Comments

Qantas' Aboriginal Ties: Wunala Dreaming

29/10/2015

0 Comments

The relationship between the principally white settlers of Australia and the native Aboriginal population has been one of exploitation, theft and effective extermination. However despite the lack of redress and continuing marginalisation of Aboriginal populations aspects of Aboriginal culture have become popular in the mainstream. Qantas, an important standard bearer for Australia's image abroad, has done much to this end by showcasing Aboriginal artwork on four of its fleet beginning with the most famous - Wunala Dreaming.

0 Comments

Aussie Electras Pt2: LEAPing Beyond

7/7/2015

0 Comments

Ansett's benefit of operating Electra's first was short-lived and by early July there had been a swing back towards TAA. TAA's traffic had fallen from a 54.2% share to as low as 46.7% but was back over 50% after its own Electras arrived. The Electras had however not been an unparalleled success with both airlines suffering a high rate of mechanical and electrical malfunctions.

0 Comments

Aussie Electras Pt1: TAA's Caravelle No Go

6/7/2015

3 Comments

Trans Australia, the Government owned airline of the two Australian majors, had always made the running in equipment purchasing decisions when it faced ANA as its competitor. However the concept of a state owned carrier didn't always fit with the political ideology of the party in power and at various times impeded TAA's ability to get what it wanted. This became more obvious once Ansett tookover ANA.

3 Comments

Piston Roos: Long Serving Qantas DC-3s and DC-4s

25/4/2015

0 Comments

Qantas has been renowned for being on the cutting edge of long-haul travel with the best equipment: Connies in the 1950s, 707s in the 1960s and 747s in the 1970s. Along with that is a reputation for safety that is second to none. However even during the regulated era Qantas wasn't just a long haul airline as it had duties to perform closer to home. These involved using more primitive equipment well into the 1970s in the form of Douglases stalwart C-47/DC-3 and DC-4s.

0 Comments

<<Previous

Forward>>

Ansett's Last Props: The F50 Euroglider

Pacific Rockets: Fijian One-Elevens

Kiwi Budgies Pt1: Mount Cook HS 748s

Godwits to Korus: 737-200s in New Zealand

Stability First: Ansett and TAA's Cross-leased DC-6s

From BCPA to TEAL: DC-6s over the Pacific

Ansett's 1980s Re-equipment Binge

Last Minute Korus: NZ's 737-300s

TAA Short Haul T-Jets Pt2: Look of the 70s

TAA Short Haul T-Jets Pt1: DC-9s or One-Elevens

First Domestic Widebodies in Oz: TAA's Airbus Indigestion

Qantas' Aboriginal Ties: Wunala Dreaming

Aussie Electras Pt2: LEAPing Beyond

Aussie Electras Pt1: TAA's Caravelle No Go

Piston Roos: Long Serving Qantas DC-3s and DC-4s

Author

Archives

Categories