The first flight of Air New Zealand's Boeing 787-9 ZK-NZE a few days ago prompted us to take a look back to the first use of these registrations marks and thanks to Paul Sheehan for these wonderful images and review:
The registration ZK-NZE was first worn on the iconic Douglas DC8-52 c/n 45985. The aircraft was built by the Douglas Aircraft Company, Long Beach, California, with a line number of 336. Its first flight was conducted on 11 January 1968 wearing a Douglas allocated test registration. On 27 February 1968 the aircraft was handed over to Air New Zealand at Long Beach and it entered onto the NZ aircraft register the same date.
ZK-NZE arrived at Auckland on delivery from the USA on 28 February 1968 and flew with the airline through until 1982. It had the honours of flying the final DC-8 passenger service into Wellington on 13 December 1981 with a trip from Brisbane.
She was sold to Howard Golden, New York City in July 1982 and cancelled from the NZ aircraft register on 23 August that year with a period of time stored at Palm Springs and then moved to Marana, Arizona. In July 1983 it became N4292P, still with Howard Golden and then a transaction in May 1987 saw records indicate a move to Landen Financial Corporation, an associate company of Howard Golden. It moved back to Howard Golden a few months later before yet another transaction on 10 October 1987 to F.B. Ayer trading as F.B. Air Inc of Miami, Florida. On 23 December 1987 title changed to Points of Call Airlines, Edmonton, Canada and was cancelled from the register on 03 May 1988 to then become C-FNZE.
In January 1990 it was leased to Fiesta Holidays, Canada then a year later to Wayfarer Holidays but was repossessed by FB Air a few days later. On 09 April 1991 it was cancelled from the Canadian register to become N223FB. By 01 May the same year another move saw it become OB-1438 and it then flip-flopped between the Peruvian operator Faucett Peru and FB Air. 18 November 1992 saw it revert to N223FB and it was placed in open storage at Opa Locka, Florida.
02 January 1994 and the former ZK-NZE became HK-3842X when it was leased to Lineas Aereas del Caribe (LAC) of Bogota, Colombia with whom it remained until July 1996. By August 1998 the DC-8, having reverted to its FAA markings, was being parted out and broken up but it wasn't until 20 September 2012 that the registration was finally cancelled as "expired"!
Does anyone have the first and last revenue flight details for ZK-NZE/1 and perhaps the delivery route flown to/from New Zealand?
