NAPC Awards

2014 Aviation Journalist of the Year

The 2014 Aviation Journalist of the Year has never been far from the winner’s podium during the time the NAPC has run these awards. Aero Australia’s Stewart Wilson brings a pilot’s scrutiny to his prolific output and an encyclopedic recall of aircraft types and their history. After training as a musician, Stewart gave away a promising career in rock & roll, for the less certain life of an aviation author and journalist. He obviously cares greatly for the industry he writes about and is never slow to offer constructive criticism where needed.

Stewart and his wife Wendy founded Aero magazine 11 years ago. Through their hard work, the magazine delivers on its promise of covering everything from military aircraft to airlines, to general aviation, for anyone who loves flying.

His body of work includes 60 books on aviation and motorsport, from the story of the Spitfire in Australia toa history of Ansett and a biography of pilot and racing driver Tony Gaze.

Runner-up in the category was Geoffrey Thomas of the West Australian, Airlineratings. com and Australian Aviation.

Geoffrey is a journalist who spent a lot of time in 2014 in front of the cameras as a subject matter expert while he was writing about the two Malaysia Airline tragedies.

His output is recognised on the world stage where he has won numerous awards.

Geoffrey brings enormous energy to his passion for the airline business. He has a great capacity to listen and process information. His book, Plane Simple Truth – coauthored with Steve Creedy, Guy Norris and Christine Forbes Smith – remains a standout work on aviation and the environment.

The other finalists for the 2014 Aviation Journalist of the Year were (in alphabetical order): Tom Ballantyne of Orient Aviation and Australian Aviation magazines; Gerard Frawley of Australian Aviation; Doug Nancarrow of Aviation Business; Matt O’Sullivan of The Sydney Morning Herald; Nigel Pittaway of Australian Defence Magazine; and Adrian Schofield from Aviation Week & Space Technology.

2014 Aviation News Story of the Year

It’s hard to remember any year in recent times which could be considered a slow news period for the airline and aviation industries in Australia and New Zealand. Events of 2014 again ensured that airlines and aerospace were seldom far from the front pages.

Although the search for MH370 and the shooting down of MH17 dominated most of the 2014 headlines, Qantas also featured heavily in the news with a very public plea to have the Qantas Sale Act repealed, its ongoing restructuring, a record $2. 8 billion loss, and not forgetting the domestic capacity war with Virgin Australia.

The rise and rise of low-cost carriers – Jetstar Hong Kong aside – and plans for Sydney’s second airport also generated entries in the news story section of 2014’s awards.

The entries in this category were judged on their news-breaking capacity, overall credibility and accuracy, the importance of the issues highlighted, level of understanding and writing style.

Highly commended in this category for 2014 were Matt O’Sullivan of the Sydney Morning Herald for ‘Hockey kept close tabs on Qantas’; Geoffrey Thomas writing for the West Australian for ‘Airline rules out buying into Qantas’; Adrian Schofield of Aviation Week & Space Technology for ‘New Blood – Air New Zealand taps latest Boeing and Airbus offerings to overhaul its international fleet’; and David Flynn from Australian Business Traveller for ‘Why Qantas’s $2. 8 billion loss isn’t such a scary number’.

The runner-up in this category was Ben Sandilands of Plane Talking. Ben’s balanced and thoughtful coverage of the Malaysia Airlines tragedy since March drew international praise during the year. His story ‘MH370 interim report is seriously deficient’ continued his measured challenge of claims and counter-claims surrounding the disappearance of this airliner and its 239 occupants.

The winner of the 2014 Aviation News Story of the Year is Geoffrey Thomas, writing in The West Australian.

To describe Geoffrey as prolific would be quite an understatement. His annual output is always a substantial and thought-provoking body of work. His coverage of the MH370 search was extensive and in addition, Geoffrey also did dozens of TV and radio interviews as an expert commentator, making the news as well as writing it.

Geoffrey’s story ‘MH370 search shifts south’ broke news of the move of the search for Malaysian Airlines flight MH370 from the South China Sea to the Southern Indian Ocean. The story was the result of a journalist on top of his game using his contact book to best advantage.

2014 Aviation Feature of the Year

After 15 years, the Feature Story of the Year category remains the most competitive section attracting the highest number of entries each year. Many of this year’s 52 entries were potential winners.

The entries for 2014 highlighted the diversity of aviation feature writing and the story-telling ability of our industry’s journalists.

Feature writing is a specific art and entries in this category were judged on their ability to present issues of importance to the industry in a thought-provoking way, a demonstrated understanding of the issue discussed, and the relevance and accuracy of the issue presented.

Highly commended for 2014 were Robert Wilson in Flight Safety Australia for ‘Regular public astronaut’; Paul Sadler in Australian Aviation for ‘Flying between the flags – celebrating 40 years of Australia’s oldest helicopter rescue service’; Geoffrey Thomas in Australian Aviation for ‘Time for change? Qantas at the crossroads’; and Macarthur Job in Flight Safety Australia for ‘A Dragon’s last flight’. The runner-up prize in this category went to Cameron Stewart writing in The Australian’s Inquirer section for his story ‘Flight to Freedom’, an exclusive inside look at a remarkable Qantas lobbying campaign for changes to the Qantas Sale Act.

There was a joint winner of the 2014 Aviation Feature Story of the Year this year – Matt O’Sullivan and Adele Ferguson of The Sydney Morning Herald.

Their feature article ‘Mayday’ ran in the Herald’s business section and took a close look at the events and management changes leading to Qantas’s groundbreaking alliance with Emirates Airline, the underperforming international division and the airline’s request for government loan guarantees.

2014 Aviation Defence Story of the Year

The commissioning of the Navy’s new landing helicopter dock ship Canberra earlier on the same day as the awards ceremony provided an appropriate context to presenting the 2014 award for defence writing.

In 2014 defence acquisitions and the tempo of Middle East operations again provided much subject material for defence writers who approached their targets from a wide variety of starting points.

Entries in this category were judged on the basis of subject value and importance to the industry, the writer’s demonstrated understanding of defence issues, depth of coverage and style, and accuracy.

Highly commended were: Gerard Frawley of Australian Aviation for ‘All in: Decision time for RAAF F-35 buy as USAF circles the wagons’; Rob Neil writing for Pacific Wings for ‘AIR 5428 and the ADF’s future pilot training system’; Stewart Wilson in Aero Australia on ‘RAAF – the second 50 years’ and Andrew McLaughlin writing for Australian Aviation for ‘Red Flag – learning to survive an air war’s first 10 days’.

2014’s runner-up prize went to Tony Moclair.

Tony’s article ‘The labours of Hercules’ published in Australian Aviation reviewed the C-130’s record in 56 years of RAAF service and progress the air force has made improving the capability of the C-130J, now at its half-life point.

The main prize for the 2014 Defence Story of the Year went to Nigel Pittaway.

Nigel’s Air Forces Monthly article ‘Small but deadly – Australia’s forces’ was a data-rich overview of the Australian aerial order of battle. This 12-page story demonstrated the author’s knowledge of military aviation in this country.

2014 Aviation Technical Story of the Year

The Aviation Technical Story of the Year is a specialised category focusing on developments in aviation technology and commercial aerospace,including aircraft, avionics and air traffic management.

It requires not only a good grasp of issues often highly technical in nature, but also an ability to clearly communicate those issues to a broad readership.

Entries for 2014 covered topics such as human factors and aviation safety, navigation, engine technology, capturing and storing data from unmanned aerial systems, and the increasing use of composite materials in aircraft manufacture.

Highly commended were: Tom Ballantyne in for Australian Aviation for his article ‘Back to school – Airbus revolutionises its pilot training program’; Denise McNabb of Aviation Business for ‘Composites key to Australia’s competitive edge’; Owen Zupp in Australian Aviation for ‘Down to the minima’; and Geoffrey Thomas of Australian Aviation for ‘X marks the spot – launch of the 777X’ The prize for runner-up in this category went to Nigel Pittaway writing in Air International.

Nigel’s article ‘Digital Interface’ was a typically indepth story focused not on the F-35’s well documented problems but on the JSF operations and management system which provides a deployable operations and maintenance interface with the aircraft.

The prize and trophy for the 2014 Aviation Technical Story of the Year went to Geoffrey Thomas of Australian Aviation.

Geoff’s winning story ‘Coming up short’ examined the human and technical factors behind the crash of Asiana Airlines flight 214 at San Francisco last year.

He drew on global expert resources to produce a compelling account of why this accident happened on a fine day with a serviceable aircraft.

2014 Aviation Online Story of the Year

This award reflects the continued growth in digital and social aviation reporting through blogs, online magazines, newspaper websites and video channels.

Entries in this category were published uniquely online and were judged on their style, the author’s understanding of the topic and on their imaginative use of the online medium.

Highly commended were: Gerard Frawley writing for Australian Aviation ‘Is James Hogan aviation’s most influential Australian?’; Owen Zupp of Australian Aviation for ‘What is an RNP approach?’ Robert Wilson writing for Flight Safety Australia for ‘Being human: safety and the limits of memory’; David Flynn of Australian Business Traveller for ‘Photo gallery: Latest Qantas 737-800 in Aboriginal livery’ and Andrew McLaughlin writing for Australian Aviation for ‘ANAO releases damning report into ADF MRH 90 program’. The runners-up cash prize went to Margo Marchbank of Flight Safety Australia.

Margo’s contribution this year was ‘RPA – taking flight in Australia’.

The winner of the prize and trophy for Online Contribution of the Year went to Tom Ballantyne.

Among considerable early speculation and farfetched theories about what really happened to MH370, Tom’s contribution to Al Jazeera online‘Malaysia Airlines: Blame game has yet to begin’ was one of the few voices of reason in a heated media atmosphere.

2014 Aviation Photographer of the Year

While there can be no underestimating the value of being in the right spot at the right time for the perfect photograph, this award is designed to reflect the body of a photographer’s work and their contribution and commitment to aviation photography.

Entries in this category were judged on the quality of the photographs, the creativity displayed in the entries and the photographer’s commitment to excellence.

The winner of the 2014 Aviation Photographer of the Year was Paul Sadler of Australian Aviation.

Paul is one of Australia’s most accomplished airto- air photographers and submitted an impressive portfolio focused on his love of helicopters. But his tail shot of a Hornet fighter turning sharply under afterburner was particularly evocative.

The runner-up was Martin de Ruyter of The Nelson Mail.

Martin continues a strong tradition of New Zealand photographers winning prizes in this category – and his own record of being runner-up in this category last year.

Other finalists, in alphabetical order, were Peter Clark of NZ Aviation News; Rob Finlayson of Australian Aviation; Derek Flynn of The Marlborough Express, Seth Jaworski of Australian Aviation and Airliner World; Nigel Pittaway of Australian Defence Monthly and Air Forces Monthly; and Owen Zupp in Australian Aviation.