KWK Transport...Derby WA

[ExSky]

Derby GA & KWK

I lived on Louisa Downs in the Kimberleys from 1965 to 1970. Lou Kent was in full swing at that time. He also had a cattle trucking business. We regularly saw the Baron (K?K) at Louisa when the Cattle buyers from the meatworks used to visit, and the PMG (Telstra) installed a new overhead telephone route following the then dirt “highway” from Port Hedland north with a repeater station just by the homestead that continually failed.

His C205 (K?K) was also a frequent visitor and it used to suffer real badly from vapourisation problems in the fuel injection system on takeoff on hot days. There was no taxiways and the strip was short with lots of rocks and the engine couldn’t be run up to clear it. One of the reasons we bought a C182 (VH-DGG) in 1967. I started flying it as a 16 year old on a restricted license in late 1968 and savoured every moment.

Dick Robbie’s C182 (VH-AEH) was favoured by Govt depts that visited, and on one occasion we went for a joy flight around the station we got hopelessly lost, a lesson I never forgot in my later flying career where I always had a WAC chart on my lap, even when flying IFR. Dick Robbie purchased a C337, which a real novelty when it arrived. I could never figure out where the wheels went when retracted.

Apart from Tim Emmanual (who had a C182 on Gogo) and occasional Fletcher geophysical aircraft and the odd Bell 47 there weren’t to many aircraft around then.

100 hourly’s were always a problem, with only MMA having engineers in Derby, and only if Cyril Kleinig agreed via RFDS telegram would they service our 182, otherwise it was a trip to Darwin.

The DC-3’s used to do the station runs, I travelled in them regularly in the cockpit with the pilots, and I was on the inaugural Twin Otter flight (VH-MMY). Little did I realise some 9 years later I would be flying a Twotter (VH-TNM or TNS) for Transwest on the same routes.

There was the Scottish Twin Pioneer which operated out of the Australia Iron & Steel hangar, which later became Aerial Enterprises (Dick Robbie). There is a wreck on Koolan Island, I think that is where it ended up. I took a fully loaded C421 in there on a proving flight some years later (Have photo to prove it!). The Twin Pioneer wreck off to the side of the runway was always a sober reminder.

The RFDS operated a straight tail Queen Air (VH-FDV), and Robin Miller and Dr Dicks used to fly around in a Mooney Super 21 or a French Rallye. The cockpit of the Rallye is in the Airforce Bullcreek Museum in Perth. When they visited the station my father was so impressed he nearly bought one on the spot!

I started commercial flying out of Port Hedland in 1976 for Transwest, and moved as base manager/check pilot to Derby in 1979 when MMA pulled out. Flew all the aircraft mentioned above, and it was bloody hot hard work.

We operated out of the Lou Kent’s old hangar. It was an exciting time, and a great place to work with all the MMA & FS guys, although there was always superficial banter with the FS guys who thought they were ATC. They weren’t supposed to look out the window, but often did to remind us not to cancel our sarwatch until we were clear of the runway. They were great during the height of the wet when we would often ask them what the “real weather” was like.