Today's interesting visitors

There were a couple of interesting visitors to Wellington and the aero club today. The first is a Cessna 172RG, ZK-ETG, which is registered to a Hamilton address. As far as I can tell, this is one of only 3 C172RG aircraft on the New Zealand aircraft register.

The second is a Glasair Sportsman 2+2, ZK-SPO, registered to a Feilding address. This amateur-built aeroplane has a real sharp paint job, and seemed to have a lot of get up and go when it left later in the day.

Whisper Jet Jets In

Today's biggest surprise was the arrival of a one-of-type for the New Zealand register - a Bristish Aerospace BAe 146 series 200, ZK-ECO. This aircraft is registered to Air National Corporate, and appeared to be on a charter flight, with a couple of buses pulling up to collect the passengers.

I've flown on this type a couple of times when Ansett NZ was flying a few years ago. Pictures are from final approach to parked up for the evening.

Two Cessnas, a Piper and a Canadair

A mixture of pictures from a rather windy Wellington today. There were two big surprises today. The first was a Canadair CL-600-2B16 Challenger, registration N696HS which flew in from Auckland [NZAA]. The other is a surprise for the next post...

Other aircraft in this post are Cessna T210R, ZK-TOR, if a Feilding address. Next is Cessna 172S, ZK-CTD, registered to CTC Aviation in Hamilton. The final picture is Piper PA28-161, ZK-WEH, registered to the RNZAF Base Auckland Aviation Sports Club of Whenuapai. These aircraft, along with several Pipers from Cantebury Aero Club were parked up outside the Aero Club.

Enjoy the pictures!

Flying today!

Today dawned windy and gloomy, but forecast to improve throughout the day, which it did :-) I got to take up the club's Cessna 172 ZK-FLT for a quick flight out of the control zone, off towards Paremata and Mana Island for some rate 1 turns, back to the Hutt Valley and some slow flight, then back for a couple of circuits.

Awesome fun... although no time for photos. The images from today are:

General Dynamics Allison 440/ 580 Convair, ZK-CIB, registered to Air Chathams

Cessna 510 Citation Mustang, ZK-MUS, registered to Acernus Aero [with the awesome Royal Air Force C130J, ZH872, in the background]

Piper PA38-112 Tomahawk, ZK-JFE, registered to Wellington Aero Club

RAF C130 Hercules at Wellington

A big surprise this evening, while I was enjoying a quiet rum & coke at the WAC bar, was the arrival of a Royal Air Force [RAF] Lockheed Martin C130J Hercules, registration ZH872.

Enjoy the pictures!

Various pictures from today...

There are two posts from today's spotting. This first one contains some general pictures. The next one will contain something rather unusual for Wellington.

Top to bottom are:

2x Fairchild SA227-AC, ZK-NSS and ZK-LFT, registered to Airwork Flight Operations [operated for Lifeflight Trust]

Boeing B737-33R, ZK-SJB, registered to Air New Zealand

Cessna 510 Citation Mustang, ZK-MUS, registered to Acernus Aero Ltd

Piper PA32R-301 Saratoga, ZK-ZIG, registered to Golden Bay Air

Diamond DA42 and Nanchang CJ6

I didn't spend a long time at the aero club today - busy with other things, although I did get pictures of Nanchang CJ6 ZK-MAO starting up, and of a visiting Diamond DA42 Twinstar, ZK-CTK.

Enjoy!

Rain and wind

There was not much happening at the aero club today... little wonder considering the rain and a stiff northerly.

Pictures are of a Pacific Blue Boeing B737 lining up in the murk, and an Air New Zealand Airbus A320 emerging from it on short final approach.

Citation Mustang and a Saratoga

It was windy again today and just two aircraft that are worth mentioning.

The first is Cessna 510 Citation Mustang, ZK-LCA. This aircraft is registered to Air Hawkes Bay of a Hastings address. By my count, this is the 4th Citation Mustang currently on the New Zealand register [not sure however if any have arrived and left in the past couple of years].

The second aircraft is a repainted Piper PA32R-301 Saratoga, ZK-ZIG, which is registered to Golden Bay Air [formerly Capital Air] of a Takaka address. I've featured this aircraft several times in the past [check out the label cloud of aircraft regos on the right], but this is the first photo of it in the current paint scheme.

Enjoy!

Another Tomahawk at WAC

With the strong winds we've had recently, there was no flying today [and probably not much tomorrow] which is a bit of a shame. It does make for some interesting "arrivals" from some of the airliners operating out of Wellington, but I'd need to have my camera ready to show some of those :-)

A "new" Piper PA38-112 Tomahawk has made its way in to the Wellington Aero Club fleet. This one is ZK-ESG and is here in anticipating of another Tomahawk running out of engine hours shortly.

Here it is parked up in the WAC hanger [along with the rest of the fleet today].

Cross country scenic flight...

Today was the day for a big flight that I had been planning for all of... a few days :-). I was fortunate to have a cousin, Jayne, and her friend Mel along for the ride. The flight was from Wellington, across Cooks Strait, through the Wairau Valley, to Lake Station/ Nelson Lakes then to Nelson and back to Wellington. This includes some of the best scenery that the country has to offer, and I had not been through much of it before.

I had never been to Lake Station before, but eventually found it hiding among all of the awesome countryside :-) I ended up taking one of the glider pilots [student??] up for a big circuit since he had never flown in a powered aircraft before... managed the worst landing in a long time... probably put him off :-) ha haha

Unfortunately, I only have a couple of photo of Nelson airport, but Jayne has promised a few photos of the enroute scenery in a few days. As you'll see in the first photo, I was flying the Club's Cessna 172N, ZK-FLT [Jayne is the one getting all excited!]. The other photo is from the pumps back to the Nelson airport terminal.

All in all, 3.2 hours of flying and a lot of fun! More photos to come, but enjoy these for now!

Chilean Navy Lockheed P3 Orion

Today's unusual visitor is a Chilean Navy Lockheed P3ACH Orion. I didn't see a registration/ identifier, but I'm sure this will crop up in the near future... :-)