The Hughes 500 in NZ

[Peter Lewis]

ZK-HHX/2 Wanganui Aero Work 1994, looks like Taihape

[granny]

AMS888
The photo of the D model ZK-HMG was taken in Feb 1986 I recall -I have an original at home somewhere-Photo was taken by Phil Wright.It is sitting in a tributary of the Waitoto. There was a T/R strike the evening before and Marty and Phil Wright slept the night in the aircraft being eaten by sandflies.
When they landed there in the stream it was dry but it rained all night and the stream came up. When it was flown out the water was right up on it.
The machine was painted when it was flown by Les Maas he unfortunately exited the machine after netting a deer and was hit by a blade in the helmet-he survived and lost his medical-his partner in Mountain Helicopters -John Dixon from Hokitika took it over, it was flown by him and Chris Cowan.They flew it until John lost his medical and sadly passed away in November 1985. Helicorp was formed and purchased the machine and operation from Johns wife.
Marty flew this machine for a while until the wheels fell off Helicorp.
It was overall orange with a white dog box-with black and white checker on fwd dogbox and vertical stab.
The ID number 'K' was black on a white background.
Hope this helps
Cheers

[planecrazy]

Found a couple more pic's of Alan Bond's 500D.

Taking off from the car park at Mount Hutt and landing heli skiers in the back country (1987 or 88)

[Deleted]

A couple of pages back I posted photos of a Rex Forrester book with photos of the ZK-HUT crash at Hood in 1986. I got permission from Mario Geremia to upload his video of the display and crash to YouTube:


And another video recently uploaded:

[camtech]

Note the spectator in the second video - very blase when the accident happens and does not appear to react - cool!

[Deleted]

Anyone have any new/rediscovered photos of the venerable 369/500 to share? I'm always keen to see more of ZK-HLL!