Getting the ‘doctor’ to fly again
South Canterbury Aviation Heritage Centre members with a jigsaw puzzle that will end up being a museum piece. From left, Peter Jost, Ron McDougall, Don Bayliss, Graeme Brookland, Jeff Macdonald and Hamish Cameron.
It’s the ultimate jigsaw puzzle, soon to take off in Timaru.
The South Canterbury Aviation Heritage Centre hope to reassemble an almost 40-year-old former New Zealand Flying Doctor Service aircraft – a Cessna 421 – offered to them by Timaru-based aircraft maintenance facility Avtek.
Avtek has had the aircraft in its care for ‘‘a year or two’’, but the plane’s owner, Christchurchbased Garden City Helicopters, now wants to donate it, heritage centre spokesman Hamish Cameron said.
‘‘We’re now in the process of assessing what we need to do to set it up as a museum exhibit.’’
The project will be a challenging one as reassembly of the plane requires putting together about 10 big pieces, as well as many small parts.
Cameron said the centre is yet to decide where the plane could eventually be exhibited.
They were also working on ‘‘how we’re going to actually manage the whole thing; who’s going to run the rebuild and everything else’’.
‘‘It’s a very exciting project. ‘‘Avtek have always serviced the plane, and it’s been part of the flying doctor’s service – it’s been in and out of Timaru for years, so it’s got quite historic importance for our area.’’
He said the plane was built about 1980.
The project’s cost is unclear but the group would undertake fundraising.
Cameron said while the aeroplane was ‘‘ancient’’ it was ‘‘quite beautiful’’.
It had a ‘‘very capable and fast’’ twin-engine aircraft, he said.
‘‘We’ve got to work out a plan . . . there’s obviously a lot of parts to put together, so we’ve got plenty of people to call on that can help us out with that.’’
He did not know the cost of the plane, but a similar model from the United States would be worth more than NZ$1 million.
Cameron said the project would likely be the biggest the group has tackled.
‘‘We’ve got an aircraft building and restoration workshop, but this one probably won’t even fit in the workshop.
‘‘We would welcome any new members that would be interested in the rebuild of an aircraft.’’