Happy New Year!

Happy new year and welcome to 2013!

In this first post for 2013, I've included the last photos taken from 2012. These were all taken at the Wellington Aero Club [a great place to take that first step or to continue your flying!] yesterday afternoon.

The first is the Nanchang CJ6, ZK-MAO, looking great in its new coat of paint [it probably helps that it was cleaned earlier that day as well!]. The second is Piper PA28-161 Warrior, ZK-MBG, which I last flew a few days again. Finally we have Beech C90A, ZK-SKL, registered to Skyline Aviation.

Two Pipers and Three Engines

I didn't get up to much this weekend. I was planning on flying to D'Urville Island but that did not eventuate. A couple of visitors though were these two Pipers.

The first is Piper PA28-161 Warrior, ZK-MBE, all wrapped up against the expected bad weather for the next few days. Until late last year this aircraft was registered to Massey University but with their change of fleet, the aircraft appears to have been sold. It still resides in Palmerston North.

The second is Piper PA31 Navajo, ZK-JGA, registered to Air Manawatu. I believe that it was being used as an air ambulance today.

More flying and more visitors

Today was another grey day, but certainly better than yesterday. There was much less wind today, and so after yesterday's lumpy circuits, I went for a few more today, and it all went much much better :-). Again, the aircraft was Piper PA38-112 Tomahawk, ZK-JNE.

Bombardier Learjet LJ45, VH-CXJ departed Wellington today after an overnight stop. I presume it was heading back to Australia.

Piper PA28-161 Warrior, ZK-MND arrived and left today back to its home airfield in Rangiora.

Lastly, there is a picture of Air New Zealand Boeing 737-300, ZK-NGK, landing.

Today's visitors

Here are a couple of today's visitors to Wellington. The first is a rescue helicopter. ZK-HZN is an Aerospatiale AS 350BA and I think this is operated by Helicopters Services (BOP) Ltd for the Phillips Search and Rescue Trust, based in Tauranga or Taupo.

ZK-EQS is a Piper Warrior PA28-161 and was previously based at Wellington Aero Club, albeit with quite a different paint scheme [this one is much nicer :-)]. I flew this aircraft to Nelson and remember it as a nice aircraft that was a pleasure to fly.

Finally, ZK-KAP is a Partenavia P68C and based with Kapiti Aero Club [at Paraparaumu airfield]. The aircraft was flown down [a 20 or so minute flight each way] for a 1 hour stop over by another Wellington Aero Club member.

More visitors then I'm back to work

Today is my last day of the Christmas holiday break; tomorrow I head back to work, and back to the [more or less] weekly updates for the blog.

Today's visitors included a couple of PA28's and an Australian registered Convair.

ZK-LJE is a Piper PA28-181 Archer registered to Canterbury Aero Club in Christchurch. ZK-FTR is a Piper PA28-161 Warrior registered to Air Hawkes Bay [I think this was on an IFR training/practice flight...?].

The Australian visitor is a Pionair Convair 340, registration VH-PDW. Interestingly, while the CASA website says Convair 340, Pionair's website says Convair 580. Not sure what or why there is this difference.

Enjoy the pictures... now I'm off to earn some dollars to pay for this flying gig! :-)

New Canterbury Warrior

A quick trip to the Aero Club today resulted in nothing much happening, but I did spot this Canterbury Aero Club Piper PA28-161 Warrior III parked up. ZK-LJD is a very recent additional to the Canterbury fleet, with first registration on 2 October 2008. A quick peek through the perspex confirmed that this is one of the new glass cockpit models.

Massey University PA28-161

Here's a "random" couple of pictures of a Massey University School of Aviation aircraft that was parked at the aero club today. It's a PA28-161, and although that makes it nothing particularly special as an aircraft, the paint job is nice enough :-)

Auckland Aero Club

Here's a few pictures from Auckland Aero Club [AAC]. This is where I spent the past few years flying [prior to moving to Wellington]. As you can see, the weather was perfect! I was also the Club Captain at AAC for 3 years from Dec 2002 - Dec 2005.

Top to bottom, the photos are:

Auckland Aero Club clubhouse and apron
C172N ZK-JAZ in which I did most of my flying on my last visit
Grumman AA1C basic trainers - the core of the AAC fleet
PA28-140 Warrior ZK-CNI
PA28-200R Arrow II ZK-EBE [135kt cruise, retractable gear and CSU]