Drove through Newcastle this morning and according to the radio Aeropelican will close down in 6 to 8 weeks. Grabbed a local rag, and according to the front page, the land for the airport is supposed to be rezoned residential, while they move operations to Williamtown, sell the two remaining otters, and start a service to Maitland, Cessnock and Taree with its remaining Bandit. It would also appear they hope to in the long term buy Beech 1900's to replace the Bandit out of Willy. For now they will operate only with the Bandit which they have admitted is payload limited (therefore a complete dud in my words).
Somehow, I think they are just trying to convince the council the business will go on at Williamtown justifying them rezoning the Belmont land residential. The council is having the pressure put on it through the courts to buy the airport land back as it zoned it for essential infrastructure, therefore the operators cannot sell the land for profit. However, they want the council to pay full residential rates for it ($15 million) and the council cannot afford this. If they lose the court case, they will be pressured into rezoning the land residential.
In the meantime, Aeropelican continues to operate at a loss and keeps pressuring the council on the basis that it cannot make a profit. Surprise also that it has come out that one of Newcastles big time property developers has held a mortgage over the airport land for the last couple of years, and therefore pulls the strings. It was always the hope of developers that they could convince the council to get rid of the airport and develop prime waterfront land there.
One of the top surviving regional airlines in Australia falls, arguably to inept management and big business motives. A sad day for the local community, and for aviation in Australia.
