Andy Heap - Pigeon Valley resident

Andy Heap a contributor to this blog site is currently an on again - off again resident in Pigeon Valley.

Here are a few of Andy's photos of events in the last couple of weeks.

 Above and below - helicopters at work.

Time to go I should think !

Andy Heap

These photos come from Ned Dawson's Air Attack Magazine which specialises in aerial fire fighting matters.

The red arrow in the photo below shows Andy's house in Pigeon Valley  before the latest breakout.

Check out Air Attack Magazines facebook page  Here

So what do you do when awaiting news of the state of your humble abode ?

In Andy's case you go and photograph the helicopter action.

Andy Heaps photos # 1

 ZK-HDQ

 ZK-HEX

 ZK-HEX

 ZK-HFF

 ZK-HHB

 ZK-HHF

 ZK-HJI

 ZK-HJM

 ZK-HKA

ZK-HNC.

Andy Heap photos # 2

 ZK-HPE

 ZK-HPE

 ZK-HTA

 ZK-HTV

 ZK-HUE

 ZK-HUE

 ZK-HWM

 ZK-HWW

 ZK-HXX

ZK-HXX.

Andy Heap photos # 3.

 ZK-IER

 ZK-IGF

 ZK-IHL

 ZK-ILW

 ZK-IVB

 ZK-IWN

ZK-IWS.

Andy has placed many of his photos (not just these recent fire fighting pics) on flickr. see HERE

Wings Over Wairarapa (1)

The 2019 Wings Over Wairarapa Air Festival was scheduled to run from Friday 22nd February (Practice Day) to Sunday 24th February.  As things turned out only the 22nd and Saturday 23rd were flyable and the Sunday flying was cancelled.  And due to the weather and the possibility of Cyclone Oma heading our way, most of the scheduled airshow aircraft from Auckland and West of the ranges could not attend.

However, given the above and the disappointing no-show of the B 52 (for technical reasons), I found the two airshow days to be full of interesting things to see and investigate.

One of the  few visiting GA aircraft was this Diamond DA 42 Twinstar ZK-WUA which has been owned by the New Zealand International Commercial Pilots Academy (NZICPA) of Whanganui since 25/10/18.

Its registration was changed from ZK-ZYX to ZK-WUA on 24/10/18 and I think that this may be the first of several re-registrations of their aircraft as they have also re-registered two of their Cessna 172s as ZK-WUB and ZK-WUC (from ZK-OEM and ZK-CBC2 respectively).

Cessna Citation ZK-RJZ at Auckland International 20-2-2019

When I was checking out the movements at Auckland International last week, Cessna 525B Citation ZK-RJZ2 (c/n 525B0524) arrived.  It has not been posted on this blog before.

ZK-RJZ2 was first registered in New Zealand on 25/10/17, to Robert Jones Holdings Ltd of Wellington.  It replaced their earlier Cessna 510 Mustang bizjet ZK-RJZ which went to Australia as VH-FNI in August 2017.

On 13/12/18 ownership transferred to Sounds Air Travel and Tourism Ltd of Blenheim although you can just see in the above photo (through the heat haze) that it still wears Robert Jones Holdings Ltd titles under the cabin windows.

A Few Modern Airbus and Boeings at Auckland International - 20-2-2019

On my way to Wellington one week ago, I managed to photograph a few fairly modern examples from Airbus and Boeing from the carpark building:

Air New Zealand Airbus A 321 ZK-NNB was on a domestic flight.

While their Boeing 787-9 ZK-NZK headed offshore.

Air Vanuatu's colourful Boeing 737-800 YJ-AV8

and Fiji Airways new Boeing 737 Max-8 DQ-FAD.

Magnaman's weekend tour.

Magnaman did a bit of a run around last Saturday and Sunday.

Here are some of his photographs.

At Tokoroa the only activity was the Aeroprakt A-22LS Foxbat ZK-LFD (c/n 198) as listed with the Auckland Flying School Ltd 

 At McDonald's in Taupo we see the Douglas DC-3C ZK-CAW (c/n 18923) in a new scheme.

 Sitting quietly minus engines and awaiting its future fate is the GAF N22C Nomad ZK-SNZ (c/n N22B-104). 

Its registration was cancelled as Withdrawn on 12-06-2018 but it has been parked up for some time.

 Over at Hamilton we have a long shot of the Cessna 404 Titan ZK-SVI (c/n 404-0693) which returned to the NZ register on 21-11-2018 with Total Entertainments Consultants Ltd.
Previous posts on this airframe can be found HERE and Here

 And going the other way - from NZ to Australia is the Cessna 402C ZK-VAD ex Ridgeair Ltd of Richmond, seen here at Tauranga, which became VH-VID2 for operations by Handel Aviation Pty Ltd of Gymea NSW from 15-02-2019.
For ZK-VAD see Here

Pauanui

 A day of light winds and sea breezes brought quite a number of visitors to the Pauanui airfield including all the way from Whanganui the NZIC Pilot Academy Diamond DA20C-1 ZK-FIY now in a smart new silver fern scheme

Reportedly operated now by Waiheke Wings is Cessna 172P ZK-MDX

And the Tauranga Aero Club's Cessna 152 ZK-TAE