Flooding the outback

This year heavy rains in February and early March sent floodwaters streaming down the normally dry Cooper, Diamantina, Georgina and Warburton riverbeds, which in April began to reach Lake Eyre.

Even when Lake Eyre remains dry, it can provide spectacular views. Air tour firms have developed scenic flights to incorporate such regional features as the Channel Country, the Coongie Lakes, the Dalhousie hot springs and the Painted Desert near Coober Pedy.

Trevor Wright, who established WrightsAir at remote William Creek in 1990, and can have as many as seven aircraft operating sightseeing trips and regional contract work in a peak season, says “a really interesting market” has grown in the past 20 years.

So much so, that William Creek’s dirt strip is about to be sealed and, it is hoped, extended from 1100m to 1600m to enable Fokker 50s to operate through the tiny settlement, which is the nearest strip to Lake Eyre North.

Wright has built a boutique business at William Creek, with a fleet of small Cessna singles and an eight-seat GA-8 Airvan.

He undertakes flying for the mining and pastoral industries and the SA government, but his “bread and butter” work is air tourism, with his proximity to Lake Eyre an important advantage.

The huge Lake Eyre expanse covers about 9700km2, including 8430km2 in the northern section.

In 2000, the north and south salt lakes were filled by floods coursing down Cooper Creek and the Diamantina and Georgina Rivers. Last year, some water reached the northern lake, making it a happy hunting ground for air tour operators.

And this year is seeing another major replenishment from floods in the Diamantina and Georgina Rivers and Cooper Creek again. Flood waters spread across the Channel Country landscape, filled waterholes and lagoons, including the fragile Coongie Lakes, and together with torrential local rains of up to 225mm in late February and early March, isolated Innamincka and Birdsville, with floods now reaching Lake Eyre.

The huge amount of inland water was sufficient to spark widespread interest among potential visitors.

“There’s always something amazing to see out there,” says Dick Lang, who has maintained his enthusiasm for a region he first entered as an air tourism operator with chartered aircraft in 1968, and boosted his business in the 1972-74 floods which filled Lake Eyre.

Lang’s Desert-Air Safaris division of his Bush Pilots operation carried about 900 passengers into the area from Adelaide last year – representing about 80 per cent of the Adelaide company’s tourist traffic. The various operations are essentially seasonal, beginning in earnest in early April.

Apart from WrightsAir and Desert-Air, the region’s scenic flight providers include TGS Air Charter at Marree and Central Air Services at Rawnsley Park, just south of Wilpena Pound, while aircraft operating from the Wilpena and Arkaroola resorts in the Flinders Ranges also offer flights over the ancient mountains and out to Lake Eyre and its surrounds, and Adelaide based Ross Air has operated charters into the region in the past and expects more work this year.

Last year Alliance Airlines, facing reduced demand for its Adelaide based mining industry services to Olympic Dam for BHP Billiton and Prominent Hill for Oxiana (now OZ Minerals), operated Lake Eyre scenic charter flights by its 52-passenger Fokker 50s, and is returning again this year. Using Alliance charters, Australian Air Holidays has scheduled departures in June and July, including Coober Pedy and Birdsville in a two day itinerary overflying Lake Eyre and Goyder Lagoon, and the company expects to make further flights during the year.

Trevor Wright expects another influx of private aircraft, which will bring business to his licensed avgas refuelling facility.

But the declining number of avgas outlets is a limiting factor for some operators, with Air BP closing its avgas outlet at the airport of coal mining town Leigh Creek, in the northern Flinders Ranges.

That forced Dick Lang to establish his own depot at Innamincka for his outback operations into the Channel Country and Coongie Lakes as well as Lake Eyre.

It also proved the catalyst for a move to turbine aircraft for the Cessna Chieftain and 337 operator and earlier this year the two aircraft were joined by a 12-passenger Beech King Air.

Its acquisition reflects the good growth of the air tour business, particularly in the past three years, but also the difficulties of obtaining avgas in remote locations.

“Jet A1 is much more available,” Lang says. The King Air also provides greater operational flexibility and significantly longer range and is pressurised, making it ideal for the faster climbs and descents required in PNG, where Desert-Air conducts three or four air tours each year.

The turboprop aircraft will carry the bulk of Desert-Air’s workload over the next 12 months, with additional air tours through Innamincka to cover the Cooper Creek floods and the 150th anniversary of the fateful Burke and Wills expedition, as well as established PNG, Kimberley and Tasmanian tours.

Meanwhile, back at Lake Eyre, the annual tourist season has begun.

The upsurge in air traffic – which can bring more than 50 aircraft a week into the remote area – has brought some problems, commercial operators say.

Some private pilots have been slack with procedures in the uncontrolled airspace, where pilots have to decide their own entry and exit points, as well as maintaining their own separation and making their own airfield calls.

The SA National Parks and Wildlife Service, which controls the Lake Eyre National Park, has been working on a plan for uniform procedures over the region.

Proposals include standard entry and exit points, tracking and altitudes, and airstrip arrival and departure procedures.

Operators describe CASA as “proactive” and last year, after conducting surveillance of Lake Eyre region operations, determined that there was radio frequency congestion from increased numbers of commercial and private sightseeing aircraft, with unneccessary broadcasts made and incorrect frequencies used. Consequently, the regulator created a temporary ‘broadcast area frequency’ (of 127. 8 MHz) for traffic operating below 5000ft. In place from September 3 to October 31, this required any pilot entering the airspace to broadcast the aircraft’s callsign, position, present level and flight intentions, and for pilots taking off or landing at aerodromes in the designated area to also broadcast on the area frequency.

CASA communications manager Peter Gibson told Australian Aviation no further actions over Lake Eyre airspace were planned at present. However, he said CASA was aware of the issues and would further respond if necessary.

Dick Lang

Dick Lang’s Bush Pilots, Australia’s longest surviving air tour operation, is preparing to spread its wings.

With the King Air joining his small fleet in late February, the Australian outback and Papua New Guinea specialist is preparing to add several South Pacific destinations to his itineraries.

Meanwhile, following the inland inunda-tion earlier this year, he is ramping up his scenic flights over Lake Eyre, Cooper Creek and Queensland’s Channel Country, with at least 12 flights over the autumnwinter outback season.

As a teacher in Port Pirie, Dick Lang took school expeditions into the nearby Flinders Ranges and realised there was a market for outback touring. He started ground based Desert Trek in 1965 and began chartering aircraft three years later.

He gained his pilot’s licence and, after the heady years of 1972-74, when there was “a huge amount of inland water” attracting tourism business to his company, he decided to purchase a Cherokee 6, and merged the ground and air tours of Desert Trek and Desert Air.

Soon the Cherokee was replaced with a nine-seater Navajo, but the floods receded and so did business.

In 1981, Lang bought a ‘push-pull’ Cessna 337, which was more economical to operate. Apart from inland tours, he undertook commercial charters, including fishspotting flights for the tuna fleets operating out of Port Lincoln and Ceduna.

In 1986, a Queen Air was bought, primarily for reviving air tourism – “the backbone of our operations” – but also for charter work.

Then came a fateful step. Lang fell in love with the DC-3.

“I always wanted to fly one, but never had the opportunity,” he says.

In 1991, with business moving ahead again and larger aircraft required, he acquired two DC-3s, which had been operated by the original Bush Pilots Australia in Queensland, then moved to another operator which went bust. Lang bought the DC-3 pair out of bankruptcy.

“They were in a sad state when we bought them,” he recalls.

Much work went into their refurbishment, but to operate them Lang needed an upgraded AOC.

“We were given a lot of help by the (then) CAA at the start,” he says. Lang gained the necessary AOC upgrade, revived the defunct Bush Pilots name and began to operate sightseeing flights over Adelaide and the outback, and round-Australia and Papua New Guinea air tours, with wife Helen as a cabin attendant.

“The DC-3 was an absolutely excellent bush plane. It could land and takeoff in the most outlandish places. ” But his company began to have issues with the CAA.

“There was never a question of safety, but we made a few errors with paperwork and the regulations got tighter and tighter. ” He believes the aviation regulator decided that his company was too small to operate the DC-3 and kept finding faults.

After three years, he sold one of the DC‑3s to Classic Air in New Zealand.

A year later, however, a PNG Defence Force DC-3/C-47, PT05, which had doubled as the PNG prime minister’s transport aircraft, came on to the market. “It was in excellent condition, one of the best I’ve seen,” said Lang.

So he bought it. The two aircraft operated in tandem for another two years. Then, in 1997 and with the regulatory regime becoming ever tougher, Lang had an offer for the two aircraft from Sydney based Dakota National Air, and decided it was time to sell out.

“We took the opportunity to bow out gracefully,” he said.

However, Lang’s love affair with the DC-3 was not quite finished and in 1998 he successfully bid for a surplus ex ARDU DC-3/C-47 based at RAAF Edinburgh in South Australia. But it did not enter service with the Bush Pilots fleet, which then consisted of a Chieftain and a Navajo, and the aircraft ended up with the Historical Aircraft Restoration Society.

It was a reluctant exit from the type, as a large model hanging from the ceiling of his office in the Adelaide foothills attests. “But we made money out of the operation and the sales, and despite the problems, we had a lot of fun. ” Lang continued to operate nine-passenger Chieftains for outback safaris and found them fast, reliable and sufficiently rugged to operate from bush strips. In all, he has owned six of the type at different times.

Today one Chieftain remains at the Adelaide base, together with a recently acquired six-seat Cessna 337, reintroducing the type to his small fleet. And now they have been joined by the King Air.

The firm searched the internet for a turboprop that could meet its requirements, and located the King Air with an aviation firm in Texas.

It had been used by a Danish company in Greenland and had “a beautiful set of records” compiled by Danish aviation engineers, but after being acquired by an American group, had been confiscated by US authorities who believed it was destined for the drug trade. Subsequently it was picked up by the Texan firm.

Lang bought it last year, removed all the passenger seats and shipped them back to Australia in a container, installed longdistance tanks, and with Sydney based ferry pilot Lyn Gray began a five day flight through Hawaii, Christmas Island, Samoa and Vanuatu to Cairns.

The work to equip the King Air for outback flights and obtain a certificate of airworthiness took longer and was more expensive than planned, and included $130,000 for a cockpit voice recorder, multifunction display and a GPS.

Lang says Hawker Pacific did “a top job”, and after taking delivery in late February, he flew off to Lord Howe Island and Noumea to check out the airports and facilities for the first Pacific Rim tour, which was due to leave in May, and also visit Vanuatu, the Solomon Islands and PNG.

About three years ago, Lang tried to sell his business. “There were no takers,” he admits.

With the King Air in the fleet, he and his two other pilots are preparing for new challenges, which will include an expansion of the air tours and charter work.

“We’re opportunists,” Dick Lang says.

“We’re ready to swing into action whenever things happen that appeal to tourists. ”