Tiger Moth ZK-AUE

One of the vintage aircraft attending the Wings and Wheels event at Kaipara Flats airfield back in May was the DH 82A Tiger Moth ZK-AUE.  I looked at what we have posted on the blog about it and it was not much, so here is its history:

The aircraft was manufactured at the De Havilland factory at Hatfield in the UK with a constructors number of 82946 and shipped to New Zealand in kit form.  It was assembled with some local materials by De Havilland's at Rongotai with their constructors number DHNZ15 and was taken on charge by the RNZAF as NZ765 on 19/9/40.  It served with the No 1 EFTS at Taieri from 1940 to 1943 and the No 2 EFTS at Ashburton from late 1943.  After the war it was struck off charge on 15/3/48 and was registered as ZK-AUE.  It was gifted to the Wellington Aero Club but it was not used by them and stored.

On 17/5/50 ownership changed to Air Contracts Ltd of Masterton and its Certificate of Airworthiness was issued on 29/9/50.  It became Fleet # 7 with Air Contracts and carried the name "Our Alex".  As was usual for Tiger Moth topdressers back then it had an "interesting" life, hitting a fence at Kawatahi on 12/10/51 and being damaged by the wind at Waimiro on 31/1/52.  Bouncing back from these setbacks it crashed at Oporae near Weber on 18/5/52 seriously injuring the pilot Johnny Eftimopol who broke his back in the crash..

On 4/9/53 it was sold to Aerodress Ltd of Dannevirke and wore their Fleet #2 and is photo'd above at Dannevirke.  It was named "The Back Breaker" in a bit of dark humour.  It was damaged on takeoff from a farm airstrip at Ashley Clinton in 1955 but was repaired.  Finally it suffered a bizarre accident on 28/3/57 at Akito when a farm owner (who was not a pilot), attempted to taxy the aircraft and inadvertently became airborne and crashed, seriously injuring himself.  It was cancelled from the register on 10/9/57.

The remains of the Tiger Moth were stored by a couple of owners until 1982 when restoration was begun by Bruce Lynch and Bruce Johnstone, overseen by Dave Philpotts.  Temple Martin rebuilt the wings at Bridge Pa. 

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ZK-AUE (c/n 82946) was re-registered to Bruce R Lynch of Auckland on 3/6/85 and he flew it widely around New Zealand (Bruce then went on to restore Tiger Moth ZK-ASM in the same colours as ZK-AUE).  On 1/3/02 ownership changed to M V Ryan of Waharoa with whom it is still current and in lovely condition as seen in this photo of it gleaming in the sun at Kaipara Flats on 19/5/24.

Thanks to Dave Paull for the history and to Peter Lewis for the historical photos.