By Graeme Mollison and Geoff Cooper. Chris Barry, Marketing and Sales Manager for Flightline Aviation recently hosted a New Zealand tour of the Cessna 400. Graeme Mollison and Geoff Cooper both got the opportunity to fly the latest piston engined thoroughbred from the Cessna stable. Graeme Mollison: While it may have Cessna emblazoned proudly on the side, the Cessna 400 bears little resemblance ...

Plastic Fantastic—The Cessna 400 It may have begun life under a different name, but the Cessna 400—the range-leading latest addition to Cessna’s world-leading family of piston singles—is an appropriate stablemate to its high-winged siblings, according to Graeme Mollison and Geoff Cooper, who both flew the Cessna 400 during its recent New Zealand demonstration tour. The Red Checkers—Part 2: The Airtrainer Era This second ...

The 2008 annual conference of the New Zealand Aviation Industry Association (AIA) was held at Tauranga on 21–23 July. As part of a week titled “New Zealand Aviation Industry Week”, the conference preceded the Agricultural Aviation Association’s (AAA) conference at the same Tauranga venue—the first time the two associations had run back-to-back events. The AIA had been through a difficult period ...

The announcement of the imminent closing of Wigram Airfield has added another dimension to the Canterbury Aero Club’s plans to celebrate its 80th anniversary. “We are going to fly the whole fleet to Wigram early on the morning of September 20th so that members past and present can come out and do a circuit or two for the last time at ...

The New Zealand company Aviation Safety Limited has begun offering “Pocket CO 300” pocket-portable electronic carbon monoxide (CO) detectors for sale to pilots. Aviation Safety’s director, Lloyd Klee, has been looking for affordable effective CO detectors for some time. He believes the common “card” type of CO detectors—while theoretically effective when new—are frequently ignored or forgotten by pilots. Furthermore, he ...

A report by the Centre for Asia Pacific Aviation (CAPA) says that despite its relatively small size in global terms, Air New Zealand has consistently performed well in recent years in a highly competitive marketplace. For 2008, the company announced a 1% reduction in net profit and a 24% fall in operating profit for the 12 months ended 30 Jun ...

The first of the RNZAF’s Boeing 757s (NZ7571) to be upgraded by Mobile Aerospace Engineering in Alabama has been completed and returned to RNZAF service. It arrived back in New Zealand on the 4th of August after 16 months’ work in the US. By the end of 2008, both of the RNZAF’s 757s will have completed upgrades that will significantly increase ...

On Tuesday 19 August, the famous singer Andrea Bocelli, who has sold more than 60 million albums since 1994, arrived in New Zealand for a one-off concert in Auckland the following day. Television and general media reports focussed on the singer and his entourage but—to Pacific Wings readers at least—the aircraft in which Bocelli travelled to New Zealand was probably more ...

By the time this issue is read, Cessna will have delivered the 100th Citation Mustang since the type entered service in April 2007 (two of which have been delivered to New Zealand customers). More than half of the Mustangs it has delivered have gone to international owners and operators. Brazil is Cessna’s largest single international market for the Mustang outside ...

In the US, pilots who haven’t yet turned 40 now have five years between medicals and the new term is retroactive in many ways. As of July 24, a third-class medical for someone who hasn’t reached his or her 40th birthday lasts for five years, instead of three years, and a first-class medical is valid for a year—up from six ...