Microlight Aircraft of New Zealand - Early Unregistered Microlights - Terry Delore

I have previously posted that I thought Pete James was the first to fly a microlight aircraft in New Zealand when he flew his powered Easy Riser at Te Kowhai in late 1978.  However in my further research I have come across a microlight trike that potentially flew here earlier.  That trike was flown by Terry Delore around the Christchurch area in 1977 or 1978 (Terry is not sure of the date).

Terry Delore was a very early hang gliding enthusiast and he was very good at it - so good that he flew in the inaugural World Hang Gliding Championships in Austria in 1976 and won, thus becoming the first hang gliding World Champion!  In that competition Terry was flying a hang glider built by Steve Cohen of Ultralight Flight Systems in Australia and Terry was the New Zealand agent for these hang gliders.

In 1977 or 1978 Terry purchased a trike unit from Steve Cohen and bought it back to Christchurch where he attached it to a Rogallo wing hang glider.  Terry said it had a 160cc Italian engine that was really not powerful enough but he flew it.successfully as in the photo below:

The photo shows Terry Delore getting airborne in the Cracroft area on the outskirts of Christchurch.

When Terry started flying his trike it presented a problem for the then Civil Aviation Division of the Ministry of Transport as they didn't really know what to do with it.  Terry has advised:  "This is the trike the CAD would (not so secretly) come and watch flying as they were trying to make some rules around microlights.  At that time it was not registered and required a Certificate of Airworthiness and a Private Pilot's License to legally fly in NZ.  I had neither so just flew under the radar for a few years".  

Chris Payne was one of the CAD officers that was very helpful at that time, and I guess that Terry's flying would have been more visible to CAD than someone who was for example flying around their remote farm.  Eventually CAD got their head around microlights and this led to the formation of the Microlight Aircraft Association of New Zealand (MAANZ) in 1981.