The end of Air NZ subsidiary Eagle Air

[kiwithrottlejockey]

(click on the picture to read the news story)

[kiwithrottlejockey]

I guess it has become inevitable over the past couple of years, but still sad to see the upcoming demise of Eagle Air.

I flew numerous times with Air Central; and on a couple of occasions with Air Eagle before the two companies merged into Eagle Air and became an Air NZ subsidiary, then I have flown on a huge number of occasions with the merged company since then, as recently as a couple of months ago.

Another name goes down the tubes to join many more from the past.

[kiwithrottlejockey]

• Eagle Air closure to cost high value jobs in Hamilton

Tuesday, 11 November 2014, 3:30 pm
Press Release: EPMU



• Winners, losers in AirNZ revamp

(Radio NZ News — Tuesday, 11 November 2014)



• Air New Zealand cuts regional routes

(The New Zealand Herald — Tuesday, November 11, 2014)



• Regional Network Changes

(Air New Zealand website)

[jonesy]

Winners: Shareholders & CEO congratulated for a sterling effort...

Losers: Staff/Suppliers/Commuters/Tourists....

Unfortunate but unavoidable in this business climate. Great opportunity for a little battler to move in and replace ANZ, but a hellofa risk.

[ZacYates]

I'm surprised, when I heard this on Radio NZ yesterday arvo I thought it would be big news on here.

I can't imagine them filling an ATR or Dash (whichever is smaller) to fly between Auckland and Wanganui enough to make it profitable...!

[suthg]

Headlines in the Waikato Times today:

Axe swings on Hamilton Air New Zealand employees


Air New Zealand may axe up to 70 aircraft engineers and support staff in Hamilton following an announcement yesterday that it plans to close subsidiary Eagle Airways.

The airline also announced it would scrap the Hamilton-to-Auckland route from February 2016.

Eagle Airways is a regional airline flying under Air New Zealand's Link brand, servicing New Zealand's rural towns with Beech 1900D aircraft.

The Beech 1900D is coming to the end of its life and will be replaced with bigger aircraft, putting at risk the jobs of heavy maintenance engineers in Hamilton.

The national carrier confirmed it had been losing $1 million a month during the past two years on routes served by the 19-seat Beech and will take them out of service by August 2016.

-----

Luxon acknowledged the news was disappointing for the communities affected and for the staff of Eagle Airways.

"These engineers are working in highly-skilled, well-paid jobs which create a lot of value for the local economy," Strachan Crang, union EPMU's assistant director of organising, said.

"They'll find it very difficult to get similar work in the Waikato and many may have to relocate."

Eagle Air will cease operations in August 2016. There may be provision for a smaller maintenance facility to remain in Hamilton, working on other Air New Zealand aircraft.

"Fortunately there's a long lead-in time so we'll be able to make sure all our members can move to other jobs in the wider Air New Zealand group if that's what they choose," Crang said.

"Eagle Air services small airports in the regions. If those routes aren't picked up by Air New Zealand, it could have a serious impact on those communities." Luxton said Eagle Airway's 232 employees had "good redeployment opportunities" across the group.

About 130 of those employees are pilots based throughout the country.

Luxon said about 35 were engineers and 35 were support staff based in Hamilton.

He said the company would work with the staff and unions to find the best options for those staff, which may include relocating to another Air New Zealand site.

-----

Hamilton's remaining routes are likely to see an upgrade thanks to increased demand, with the restructure bringing a gradual change to 50-seat Bombardier Q300 aircraft.

The airline is buying new 68-seat ATR-200 aircraft to replace the 50-seaters on their routes. The 50-seaters in turn will replace the 19-seaters.

Other destinations moving to 50-seat aircraft include Kerikeri, Whangarei, Tauranga, Rotorua, Gisborne, Taupo, Wanganui, Palmerston North, Blenheim, Hokitika and Timaru.

Luxon said those switching from 19-seaters would see fare reductions of an average 15 per cent.

Waikato Chamber of Commerce chief executive William Durning said the announcement was a reflection on the commercial realities of the aviation industry.

"We see that there are definitely benefits for the Waikato business community. It's good to see that there's greater accessibility to Hamilton and the Waikato with those 50-seater aircraft," he said.

"There's obviously that loss of the Hamilton to Auckland flight. We don't see that as being a major for the community, there's still really good accessibility to Auckland through other means."

[e-mail]

www.stuff.co.nz/business/industries/63110447/Axe-swings-on-Hamilton-Air-New-Zealand-employees

[Dave Homewood]

So we have a Luxon and a Luxton in that article, and no first name??

[suthg]

"Chief executive Christopher Luxon said the airline had been looking at how to address the "poor operating economics" of the planes since the start of the year. Sixteen of them fly to 15 of the 25 domestic locations Air New Zealand services.

He said it surprised many people that larger aircraft were more efficient, but it came down to being able to fit more paying customers on each flight."


I am sure the "Luxton" is an honest mistake by Jamie Small.


Sorry editing and sharing just part of the article led to a lack of reference...

Graeme

[flyjoe180]

Had to happen eventually. No manufacturer builds 19-seat turboprops any longer; the 1900D has been hard worked and a great servant for Eagle and Air NZ but the cost of operating them is obviously more than they make in profit.

[kiwithrottlejockey]

I see the usual politician suspects (and one in particular) are spouting SPIN, while carefully distancing themselves from the fact that they made the decision to flog-off government-owned Air NZ shares to investors who no doubt now want their increased pound of flesh in the form of higher dividends, resulting in the sorts of cuts which are occurring, throwing provincial areas of NZ to the dogs.



(click on the picture to read the news story)

[thomarse]

I have to agree KTJ.

I'm surprised there's not more anti- Air NZ hype, and I put this forward in defence of our beloved National Carrier - as far as the domestic scene is concerned, Air NZ has had to "carry the can" on the Provincial routes whilst unable to balance that against revenue it might otherwise have gained on the Main Centre routes.

Subsidisation? Maybe, but that is what I would expect of a partly State-owned carrier.

It would be a different story if it was compulsory for Main Route carriers to offer Provincial services as well.

My $0.02 worth.

[chis73]

If there are no more new Beech 1900Ds, could we not build some under licence? Could Pacific Aerospace do this, noting that both PAL & Eagle Air operate side-by-side in Hamilton? Also, was not the government looking for a short-range maritime patrol aircraft a year or two back. Airforce could just as well use a 1900D as a multi engine pilot trainer, & VIP transport. There's an order for 25+ right there. Heck, maybe PAL could also export them. The b1900d is popular in Canada & southern Africa. Lots of people outside of the US seem to want a pressurised 19-seater, but regulation changes have made them unpopular to operate within the US. It seems Air NZ's decision has been made primarily on the presumption that there is no successor aircraft available.

More importantly, it creates jobs & encourages people to get the heck out of Auckland.

How about turning this situation into a positive for once. If the NZ aviation industry can bring back the Mossie, surely we can do this.

Chis73

[kiwithrottlejockey]

CLICK HERE to read an article published by the Whakatane Beacon newspaper, and click on the thumbnail-sized picture accompanying the article to download an awesome photograph of a Beech 1900D at Whakatane Airport.

[nosig]

Tauranga-based Sunair Aviation says it's confident it can offer a replacement service between Whakatane and Auckland

Click here for story

[kiwithrottlejockey]

Many of the places being “axed” by Air NZ did have other companies providing scheduled air services, but Air NZ indulged in price wars and ground those other companies into the ground, now they are throwing those places to the dogs after earlier getting rid of the competition.

There's a lot to be said for the social-responsibility model used to set up NZ National Airways Corporation in the late-1940s. After all, public roads are still run under a similar social-responsibility concept. Do you really think the diary farmer at the end of a dead-end country road pays the full cost of providing the public road to his gate? No, he doesn't....the cost is collectively bourne by all of us for the greater good, and because we like the export earnings that farmer brings in for the country.

The rot started to set in with the 4th Labour government in the 1980s, and each successive government has got progressively worse than what came before them when it comes to throwing certain sectors of the country and provincial areas to the dogs, then hiding behind SPIN DOCTORS to come up with the sort of “smarmy bullshit” like that which we got from the prime minister earlier today.

[philip]

Nov 12, 2014 12:45:55 GMT 12 nosig said:

Tauranga-based Sunair Aviation says it's confident it can offer a replacement service between Whakatane and Auckland

Click here for story

Sunair have recently released a timetable of services from Whitianga to Ardmore that are a lot cheaper than they used to provide to Auckland Intenational (which was a pain in itself)

[Dave Homewood]

Maybe it's time the railways put some affordable passenger trains back on the rails to the regions to make up for the loss of air services. Particularly to Northland where they have just cut the rail service.

[ErrolC]

Why on earth would that be better than buses? Trains need much larger volumes to make sense.

Sent from my D5503 using proboards

[airnz]

Does anyone know how many Atr600 will be ordered because of this and when will they arrive in nz?

[isc]

You could just about drive from Hamilton to Auckland in the time that includes waiting ,flying, getting a taxi(probably the long way round), to where you are going.
Perhaps they need something like a Cessna Caravan for some of the "lesser" destinations. isc