Movements since the last update

Tuesday 27-Jan-2009
Noted flying in tandem, transiting the Woodbourne control zone, routing from the west, passing south of Woodbourne, north of Omaka and then exiting towards the south via the ponds and white bluffs were two Nelson/Motueka based helicopters. ZK-HEX an Aerospatiale AS350BA of Reid Heslop Helicopters of Wakefield, and ZK-HEC a Eurocopter EC130 B4, operated by Tasman Helicopters Above & Beyond Ltd, of Motueka.

RNZAF B200 King Air NZ1883 was noted making an approach and overshoot at Woodbourne, before continuing on towards the west and then south.

Friday 30-Jan-2009
Arriving into Woodbourne was RNZAF C130 Hercules NZ7001

Waitangi Day Friday 06-Feb-2009
A nice change today with approaches to Woodbourne by two Cessna Citation Mustangs. Three approaches were noted with visual confirmation that the last two were operated by Napier/Hastings based N2243W. I have since been informed that Wellington based ZK-MUS was also out operating at Wellington, Blenheim and Paraparaumu today - so believe this to have been the first approach noted today. (Thanks to D Campbell for the info on ZK-MUS)

Qantas/Jetconnect News
As noted previously Qantas have withdrawn middle of the day services between Auckland and Wellington to enable maintenance on one of their fleet. This is Boeing 737-476 ZK-JTP which as noted in the last post positioned from Wellington to Christchurch on Sunday 25-Jan-2009.

Almost everyday this week QF126/125 AKL-BNE-AKL has been delayed by up to three hours. With Thursday 05-Jan-2009's flight being operated by non business class equipt B737 ZK-JNC.

(For those who are unaware trans-tasman flights are normally operated by the business class seat equipt Boeings - B733s JND and JNN and B734s JTP, JTQ and JTR. - JNB and JNC do not have business class seats and are generally only used on domestic routes)

On Weds 04-Feb-2009 Qantas operated with only 4 of their fleet of 7 aircraft active. This resulted in the cancellation of 6 services with 2 other services not scheduled. JNB and JNC were parked up, in addition to JTP

Also there is no sign yet of the former mainline B734 ZK-JTS which is set to join Jetconnect this month.