Return of the Albatross

Further, the Albatross, while it’s a niche aircraft, it does serve more than one market. Some aircraft are built to serve one, maybe two markets, but the Albatross can do everything from passenger transport, cargo, search and rescue, the VIP or private market. It can be used by commercial operators, governments, humanitarian organisations, and so on. So, it has a very broad appeal because of the nature of the airplane, which is another thing that drew us to Albatross. It also doesn’t go head-to-head with any of the big planemakers like Boeing or Airbus, we’re not really competing with anyone out of our league which could pose problems as a smaller manufacturer. These are the main things that make this project feel very special, Albatross is niche but it was a fantastic business case.

Further to what you were saying, who do you see as the likely, or the ‘ideal’ customer for the next generation Albatross?

We have quite a few potential customers. I will note that while the current Albatross is a certified airplane and the new aircraft that we are building will require a supplemental type certificate (STC) for the modifications that we’ll make. That’s our first priority so until that’s completed, we can’t really take formal orders. Another thing to note is that we don’t have a factory yet. So, you really got to have the fundamentals of the business in place before to put an order.

But we’ve had hundreds of inquiries for the aircraft across the world, from airlines, cargo operators, high net worth individuals, search and rescue organisations, the list goes on. People want to use it as an emergency aircraft or maybe even convert it to a fire bomber. Though I would say around 80 per cent of inquiries to date would be for uses as a passenger transport aircraft.

Realistically, the place where an aircraft like this serves best is in south-east Asia for example, or the Mediterranean, particularly in light of recent population growth. With more people living on islands, we need to see easier access to those islands, and when there’s no room to build an airfield, it only makes sense to use an amphibious aircraft like Albatross. We are far more aware now of the environmental impact of pushing aside half an island to build an air strip, and we’re also seeing new trends in what’s called ‘eco tourism’, which again would benefit from Albatross by limiting the infrastructure required to sustain air travel.

“We are actually creating a whole new industry in Australia. It’s more than just the aircraft”

This project is the result of a lot of co-ordination between AAI and the Northern Territory government, do you want to tell us about the work that has gone on behind the scenes to date and why the NT was chosen for Albatross?

The acquisition of the type certificate was achieved a number of years ago, and that was done by AAI’s founder Khoa Hoang. He’s the man behind the idea, he sat down, thought through this, saw the opportunity and was able to capitilise on it. After that, the company made a few attempts at setting up, but finding the right home for Albatross wasn’t as easy as you might think.

Khoa Hoang wanted the project done in Australia, first and foremost, so then it was about finding an airfield that’s large enough with enough land around it for us to build our infrastructure. We also needed somewhere where we would not be competing too heavily with regular passenger transport, and obviously somewhere which is close to the water, and somewhere near enough to a population centre, there were so many factors to go into the perfect location, and there wasn’t actually that many that fit the bill.

We were actually well-advanced on an activity in Queensland, with the Queensland government at Maryborough at the time that we went to see the Northern Territory government – but the Northern Territory just made so much sense. From the funding infrastructure investor that we have up there in the Airport Development Group, who’s going to help build all the infrastructure for us on a leaseback basis, with the support from the NT government, its proximity to one of our main customer markets in south-east Asia. It’s also got a special migration zone which allows us to bring in skilled workers quickly so we can build a workforce quite quickly, from people that we will import the start with whilst we generate the ability to build a workforce in Australia. 

It sounds like there’s a lot of infrastructure required to make the next-generation Albatross a reality, how far into that process as you?

We are actually creating a whole new industry in Australia. It’s more than just the aircraft. Australia had part of it for a while but we’ve really only had one small aircraft manufacturer in GippsAero for a long time. I think there are a couple of smaller guys, but at this scale, we will be the first air transport category manufacturer in Australia ever – or at least haven’t been able to find anything to prove me wrong on that. We’ve have had some Australian companies modify aircraft, but we’ll be the first ones to build them from scratch in Australia, at this scale. 

With that, there’s a lot that goes into building a new industry. And it’s going to take us a bit of time but we have a solid plan to get us there. At the moment, what we’re doing is we’re preparing and setting the business up to do that work. So, we’re firstly setting up the fundamentals of the business, acquiring the assets that we need to do it, then assembling the workforce. After all that, we’ll start the actual aerospace work.

This is surely great news for Australian industry in that case.

Exactly, we’re really energised by it. We were talking to one of the universities the other day who were telling us about how many aerospace engineers they graduate. And they said that most of those engineers end up going overseas because they can’t get careers in Australia, there’s just not enough work for them here. 

So, by growing up this kind of capability in the country, it will mean that quite a few more of those people can actually have fulsome careers at home. Moreover, what we’re doing here means that we can set up our own pipeline for training, and this then also extends into the other supply chain partners that sit around us to support us. This sets up an ecosystem, which is much broader than just us.

Fantastic, are you still on track to acquire the STC for Albatross by 2025?

We are going well towards that goal. At the moment, we’re in the initialisation phase so we’ve started work. We’re also currently centralising our assets into Darwin, as we’ve got an aircraft in the US and an aircraft in Melbourne at Avalon. We’re making arrangements now to get the aircraft in Avalon to the Northern Territory. We were initially hoping to fly it up but given the constraints of the international supply chain today, and the aircraft needs the engines overhauled, and those engines need to go back to the US. It’s looking like we may need to pull the aircraft to pieces and fly it to Darwin, so we can fix it there. We may end up doing the same for the US-based aircraft, too. 

On top of that, we’ve established a small office set-up in Darwin and we’re working with Airport Development Group to get a hangar so we can start some early work whilst they build the dedicated facilities that we are going to need for research and development activity. Along with this, we’re also chasing the last part of our investment which closes that gap.

“We are not going to stop at just the variant that we’re working on now”

For anyone familiar with the original Albatross, what are the aspects that we might find familiar in the next-generation variant, and what aspects have been completely reimagined?

The first thing we’re going to do is change the engine, that’s the biggest difference that you would notice from the outside perspective. We’re moving from an old piston engine to a modern turboprop engine from Pratt & Whitney, so it’s a whole new propulsion system. But at the heart, we want to keep hold of the things that made the Albatross so great. It was always a remarkably robust aircraft, with its aluminium airframe – the Americans used to refer to it and other aircraft that came out of Grumman as ‘Grumman Ironworks’ because they were so hardy and so well-built. So that’s one aspect that we want to keep the same, particularly given the environments that Albatross will operate in. It’s an amphibian aircraft so it can and will take a hit, and if it gets a dent or a scratch and needs a repair, that’s something that can be done quite easily in that environment. Whereas, if it were a composite aircraft, those repairs wouldn’t be as straightforward and it would become a more difficult task.

So, the first few iterations of our Albatross will be quite similar to the original, it’s a utility aircraft that’s very robust and will look largely the same except for where the engines are. There are some minor changes we might make around some of the flight control surfaces which are currently canvas, and that will be done by our engineering team. In the cockpit, our aim is to keep the cockpit largely as it is, except for the things that we will need to put in there to meet the regulations for modern aircraft. We’re still doing the analysis on just how far we need to and are going to take that.

What are your goals for your longer-term goals for the next-gen Albatross?

We are not going to stop at just the variant that we’re working on now. Our plan is to have a fully electric version of Albatross within 10 years. Some will say that’s ambitious, but that’s something that we’re really keen to achieve. Given that the aircraft serves these smaller islands that are impacted by climate change, given the rise in eco-tourism, having something that doesn’t require fuel, and doesn’t require propellers in the water, an electric Albatross is perfect for those more sensitive areas.

We’re also investigating other models of Albatross that we could create in the future. One concept we’re looking at is a stretched-out version with 44 seats. As I mentioned earlier, capacity is a huge issue for a lot of the operators that we’re looking to serve and in a lot of the markets we’re looking to serve, so it would be incredible for us to increase capacity. There are plenty of other options and ideas out there too, just about everyone who has contacted us to-date has thrown a new idea for the aircraft into the ring. The key thing is, we’re setting up an aircraft manufacturing company, and that doesn’t stop with one variant of one aircraft. We fully intend to evolve and grow in the long-term.