Saturday 29 October 2016

Tauranga last weekend # 1

Allan Wooller spent some time at Tauranga Airport over Labour Weekend and has kindly sent in these photographs.
 The De Havilland DH114 Heron Series 1B ZK-BBM (c/n 14011) joined NZNAC on 19-12-1952 and carried the name Matapouri.
It was withdrawn in July 1957 and stored at Palmerston north until heading off to Fiji to become VQ-FAY in November 1960. In April of 1974 it transferred to Air Pacific and was re-registered as DQ-FAY that October. 
It returned to New Zealand with aspirations of becoming ZK-EEX but instead took up its original ZK-BBM markings with Air North from 19-11-1975.
Nationwide Air Ltd of Auckland took it over from 19-09-1978 and it was withdrawn and sat derelict at Rotorua.
It then passed through several owners - including Dwen Aeromotive (1972) Ltd, T.A.P.S ( The Aircraft Preservation Society),and then the Heron Restoration Society from 20-03-1989.
Its registration was finally cancelled on 18-06-1993 and it was stored at Ardmore, then at Dairy Flat in 2003 and at Tauranga from 2006. 
It has now been refurbished to its original NZNAC scheme and is part of the NZ Historic Aircraft/Classic Flyers Museum.

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