Bristow Photos

[Dave Ed]

Papa New Guinea

Papa New Guinea

Thanks to Andrew Rice for his input on this base.

PNG began for Bristow in 1985, when Pacific Helicopters bought a Puma from Bristow Australia. They had been contracted to provide helirig support for Gulf Oil, which later became Chevron. Initially two SA330J Pumas were required, one each from Bristow and Pacific. These were initially based at Tari, in the central highlands, 5,000 ft above sea level. Several BV107 helicopters from Columbia Helicopters shared the same facilities.

Crews worked 3 weeks on 3 weeks off and crew change flights arrived from Cairns in Australia. The rigs were drilling in the mountains and varied between 3,000ft and 9,000ft AMSL. In May 1986 the operation moved to Poroma, also 5,000ft AMSL. As there was no airstrip, crew change flights arrived at Mendi and the crews were transferred by helicopter.

In August 1986 the Bristow Puma VR-BIG was released from contract along with a number of BHL staff, but some Bristow crew remained to assist the Pacific staff fly and maintain their aircraft. Several other oil companies started operations in 1988 and in November that year Pacific bought two more Pumas from PHI (P2-PAY and P2-PAZ). The three aircraft continued to operate at various bases around the country, mainly in the highlands, and flew a considerable number of hours each month. Pilots could expect to fly100 hours in their three weeks of duty.

In January 1988 the operations changed to using long line and vertical reference techniques, requiring considerable pilot training.

Bristow did have a brief operation for Shell drilling in the Sepik River region in the PNG lowlands using one Bell 212 and a Tiger. Over the years the amount of flying began to reduce, and this became a dramatic reduction when Russian built aircraft began to work in PNG, lifting higher loads at considerably lower costs. The KA32 was able to lift almost twice the useful load of a Puma. The final Bristow crew left PNG in January 1991.






PNG operations seem to have been scattered around the countryside with the pictures having locations such as Tari, Paroma, Kikori and Sepic River. The contracts involved supplying technical and operational support to Pacific Helicopters for various clients and using types such Bell 212, Puma, Tiger and Hughes 300 as can be seen below.


Pumas P2-PHZ and VR-BIG (Bristow colours) at Tari.






Bell 212, P2-PHJ at Sepic River 1987. This aircraft is sporting the Bristow and Pacific names.






Bush operation with Puma P2-PAY at Kikori River late eighties.






Hughes 300 also at Kikori.






AS 332L Tiger P2-PHP location unknown.




Poroma base camp circa1986.







Crew change at Mendicirca 1987.







Gearbox change with rainbow and hangar boys at Poroma circa1986.




Cement hopper over Lake Kutabu circa 1986.






P2-PHZ at O'Malley Peaks relay station, 11,000ft AMSL, 23rd May 1986.






AS 330 Puma underslinging materials to a typical rig site.1985.