VH-KAM (2) de Havilland (Riley) D.H.114 Heron
2D (c/n 14123)
Although not flown by Connellan
Airways/Connair, this Heron was purchased by them from
Air Pacific
(formerly Fiji Airways' VQ-FAF; DQ-FAF) in 1975 and ferried to Alice
Springs
for Riley Heron
conversion with Lycomings. In the meantime it was sold to
Kendell Airlines
at Wagga and
registered to them as VH-KAM on 16 Dec 1975. Chris O'Neill's
photo (above)
was taken
at Kendell's Wagga, NSW HQ in 1978. Like VH-CLV it later
went to Davey Air
Services
of Dubbo, NSW. Chris's shot below shows it at Sydney in December
1980, just after
being acquired
by Davey for its third level local services in NSW.
In the 70s and 80s there
must have
been some sort of love affair or mutual attraction between Herons and
the South Sea
Islands for in
1985 -KAM found itself in operating in that region again, this time for
Tongair out
of Tonga.
Just why it wasn't re-registered into the A3- series is
not clear, although possibly the
lease was
short one. . Anyway, Tony Arbon took a shot of it at Sydney in
July 1985 as seen in
picture #
3. Finally, in their quest for Riley Herons, Airlines
of Tasmania acquired it in 1986
and Roger
MacDonald caught it at Essendon in March of that year (image # 4
below). It is now
retired
and exhibited at the Queensland Air Museum in Caloundra
(All photos in this entry via the
Geoff Goodall collection)
2.
3.
4.
