Re-enactment flight 50th Anniversary South Island Airways
First regional air services

Sunday 30 March 2003

Good morning, it’s great to be here with so much living aviation history in the room.

After last week when I again disgraced myself by diverting lots of the household budget out the door and into the garage for a another vintage car project I won’t dwell much on my fanatical interest in vintage machinery.

I will however say that one of the great things about any obsession with history is that you get to meet the living history as well.

You also get to appreciate how it just takes the blink of an eye to get to be part of history.

Along with my greeting from the city of Christchurch today I would like to acknowledge some of those surviving links with our aviation past who are hopefully here today for this book launch and flight.

I’m told there are quite a few links with the pioneering days of South Island Airways here today.

Notably Tony and Kathy Chadwick, Jean Waugh, the Braziers and also some of the people involved with the engineering work involved in the pioneering days.

We should also note other pioneer pilots who figure in the “Taking Off” book, such as Ian Ritchie of Ritchie Air Services and Russell Troon one of the earliest pilots for Southern Scenic Air Services.

They were part of the human face of the aviation trail-blazing that helped open up Christchurch and Canterbury to the skies.

It is a legacy worth noting still plays a hugely important role in our local economy.

The descendant industry of tourism made possible by aviation is a major driver of the Canterbury economy.

The revenues from aviation using Christchurch Airport go into the dividends paid to the public via the Council owned holdings which actually help keep your rates down.

You have the lowest rates of any major New Zealand city in part because of the work of these pioneers in outfits like South Island Airways.

We should acknowledge all those dedicated aviation fanatics and historians who put this book and event together.

Thanks Richard Waugh and co-authors Bruce Gavin,Peter Layne and Graeme McConnell.

Lastly thanks for making the re-enactment flight possible to Airwork NZ Ltd, the same company that founded South Island Airways in 1953.

It is thanks to their community spirit that this flight is taking place today.

I hope you all enjoy your day enormously.