The Boeing 737 has had a long and fruitful service in New Zealand especially in the guise of the series 200, which New Zealand became a very early home for. Operations stretched from the late 1960s into the early 2000s; first with National Airways Corporation and subsequently with Air New Zealand. The Fat Albert was the first pure jet on the NZ domestic scene and whether wearing a Godwit or the Koru proved its value to generations of kiwis.
From 1947 until 1978 New Zealand had separate government owned domestic and international airlines with National Airways Corporation (NAC) fulfilling the role of the domestic airline. Against substantial opposition, not least from the pro-British National government of the day which favoured the BAC One-Eleven, NAC became a very early customer for the new Boeing 737-200. The contract was signed for 3 aircraft on July 19, 1967 a month before the series 200 had even flown for the first time. NAC became customer 19 and so its 737s were series 219s.
The first three aircraft, ZK-NAC-E arrived from August-December 1968 with NAC pilot’s training at Boeing and getting experience at United Airlines. The 737s entered service on the main trunk route connecting Auckland-Wellington-Christchurch-Dunedin. They introduced the new NAC livery with a red cheatline, blue titles, silver belly and the famous red Godwit roundel tail logo. Fittingly the aircraft gained Maori names beginning with P of NZ animals and plants (usually birds).
The 737 fleet was expanded into the early 1970s with second-hand examples added. These included a ‘new’ series 297 (ZK-NAJ) originally built for Aloha Airlines but not taken up in July 1971, a pair of ex-PSA series 214s in 73/74 (ZK-NAK/NAL) and a series 222 (ZK-NAM). The latter was a 1968 build machine that had been a test aircraft with Boeing its whole life until then. With 7 737s in the fleet the last Vickers Viscounts were retired on June 3, 1975.
In 1975 NAC introduced its new and colourful ‘NAC Wings of the Nation’ scheme and looked towards acquiring more new 737s. These would be improved 737-219 Advanced models with the first, ZK-NAP arriving in September. The economic crisis of the mid-70s impacted even New Zealand however and the second Advanced model, ZK-NAQ, was sold after only about 6 months in service.
By the mid-70s the fate of NAC was becoming a political hot potato. It often leased the larger aircraft of Air New Zealand and was looking at purchasing 727s. In December 1977 the unpopular decision was taken to merge the two airlines though at the time it was seen as a political takeover by Air New Zealand.
The merger went ahead on April 1, 1978 and the Godwit was replaced on the tail by the Koru, with several aircraft receiving temporary schemes with the Koru and NZ titles added to the base NAC Wings of the Nation scheme. These hybrids lasted sometime with at least ZK-NA keeping her orange into 1982. The Godwit logo survived in a new place beneath the cockpit however even though these continued into the full Teal era they gradually vanished.
The mooted 3 727s were not ordered and instead the new Air New Zealand kept the faith with the 737s. The merger itself was not smooth and Air New Zealand suffered poor performance for several years attempting to subsume its small but fierce rival.
Air New Zealand received two NAC ordered series 219s in 1978 and 1980 (ZK-NAR and NAS) and a 219 Combi (ZK-NQC) in December 1982. By then the original 737 fleet was getting old with the surviving original 6 aircraft (one was sold in 1981) dating from 1968/69 and not being Advanced models.
Air New Zealand took advantage of the transition by Boeing to the newer series 737-300 and no doubt got a late 1984 order for 6 737-200 Advanceds at a good price. These aircraft, ZK-NAT-Y arrived in 1986 and allowed the sale of all the non-Advanced aircraft to International Lease Finance Corp (ILFC). These aircraft would be almost immediately on-leased to Presidential Airways (3), AirCal (2) and Frontier Airlines (1). At least one would serve to 2005. The new 737s reused the Maori names beginning with P of their predecessors.
The series 200s in Air New Zealand service allowed the airline the flexibility to right-size traffic on some of its international routes, especially to Pacific island destinations, as well as being the mainstays of the trunk domestic routes. Decisions to purchase newer 737-300s were deferred several times and these aircraft didn’t finally arrive until 1999. Instead Air New Zealand actually expanded its 737-200 fleet acquiring second-hand aircraft formerly operated by Royal Brunei, Braathens S.A.F.E as well as trios from Britannia and Air Malta.
Overall Air New Zealand operated 30 737-200s through the years though one was the early ZK-NAQ operated only for 6 months. 3 others were short term leases brought in as maintenance covers from airlines like Airways International Cymru and Britannia. Another was an ex-Ansett NZ aircraft operated for only a couple of months. In terms of the registrations of the aircraft the ZK-NA* sequence continued fitting the NAC ancestry and filling in holes in the existing sequence. Several aircraft reused registrations of already sold frames so for example there have been two ZK-NADs and NAQs.
The last service operated by an Air New Zealand 737-200 fell to ZK-NAB “Nuts and Bolts” as NZ509 between Auckland and Christchurch in December 2001. Most of the series 219 Advanceds found there way to AVIACSA of Mexico whilst aircraft of the other marks went to airlines such as ADC of Nigeria and Jatayu Air of Indonesia. The Combi NQC stayed local and joined the Airworks fleet whilst ZK-NAF joined Royal Tongan Airlines on lease from NZ in May 1999. Air New Zealand would base its future fleet around the 737-300, however their time would not be as long as the series 200s.
Note: It should be also noted that Ansett New Zealand also operated 737-100s and 200s but they are out of the scope of this piece.
References
Timetables images from the superlative timetableimages.com
Kiwi Aircraft Images – 737
Air New Zealand 737-200 fleet. RZJets.net
NZ509 AKL-CHC – Last Air NZ 737-200 Flight. Airliners.net
MacPherson, R. Airways 1936-1986 The First 50 Years
