Air Nauru - What's happening?

[Uncle Festa]

Does anybody know what's happening at Air Nauru?

I've heard rumours of developments

[mainwheel]

2 leased 757's from continental and new routes to japan, hong kong,hawaii etc etc.
Would you like to bet on it?

[ER2nd.]

I'll bet a depleted pile of **** **** it ain't gonna happen.
1. They've just had a huuuuge layup on their 10 year old RON which, one way or another, they are going to have to pay for....how?
2. With all their countries other debts/money problems how are they going to finance the lease of 2 x 757's?
3. Oh boy, I bet the locals will be pleased to hear of such plans when a lot of 'em haven't been paid for months.....
4. etc., etc.
5. Would QF (who do their maint, etc) be pleased that they bang on the door of Continental - competion of sorts in the Pacific

[RaTa]

Is G.B. still the chief pilot there?

[evolante]

Reliably aware that VH-RON will be parked up at QF facility at MEL. Air Nauru believed to have failed to have paid a court ordered sum in full to the US Bank that owns the asset.

Also reckon they may "borrow" a replacement aircraft from QF - just like they did during the recent maintenance check.

Cant see them leasing 2 x B757 under any circumstances............

[Pushback]

Come on boys, gossip is for the hairdressing salon.

Air Nauru is probably one of the best companies to work for in the Pacific, small close knit team. Financially viable and should be around til we are too old to fly.

Lets keep the comments positive ;)

[fruitbatflyer]

Agree with pushback - best little flying job in the Pacific and we want to keep it that way by resisting wacko schemes cooked up by dreamers and schemers.
Also, the new Nauru Government, for once, has some pretty smart and educated people in it who are unlikely to fall for this type of stupidity. The Island MUST have an air service, and it is unlikely to be attractive to a big operator to lob in there once a week, or month maybe. So we all better hope Air Nauru hangs in there, or else it's going to be served by two slow boats a year on their way to somewhere else. The hardship and social problems that would follow would be pretty bad, and destabilizing in a region where there's already enough of that.
So, go jam your mischievous rumours where the sun don't shine.

[Kwaj mate]

Both Boeing & Airbus reps have been seen at Nauru House in the last few weeks; supposedly talking to KC about a replacement aircraft.
It is rumoured that they are looking at both the 757Combi & A319/320 HGW aircraft.
Boeing are offering to replace the 734 with a 757Combi & maintain current lease rates.
This is a strainght swap to keep ON their books as they're scared Airbus will get into bed with ON.
Airbus, on the other hand, have offered an A320 or A319.
Again this is almost an aircraft swap, with asssistance with a massive training program.
It seems they are offering AirCalin's new engineering facilities to remove them from the QF camp.
As always the next couple of months will be interesting.
But what will hapen if the Republic loose their 734 as it is being used as security for a maturing loan.

[ER2nd.]

"...talking to KC about a replacement aircraft...." Why KC? He is nolonger the Minister in charge of transport. Reps are always floating around trying to drum up some commission. Talks can go on for years and then just fade away without an outcome. I wonder what started all this off. Just a bit of spin maybe? A new broom usualy moves the dust around for a while, then rests - could there be two new brooms in action here? (i.e. not just the new government looking at the airline). With QF (or associates) flying all around Nauru, why do Nauru need their own airline? Most travel is thru, not to, Nauru and a lot of the Nauru travel one has to wonder at the reason for it. The cost must be phenomenal running one 'modern' pax jet. Why not do a deal with a major to ensure they drop in at reasonable frequency? The OZ governments close association with Nauru could ensure that was honoured. Nauru has a regular (well it again soon will be!) air freighter service - an aircraft far better suited to carrying some of the stuff that is often rammed into the back of the 737. Not sure of the "G.B" note - I believe shd be K.P. thes days.

[fruitbatflyer]

Of course Nauru can't really afford a flag carrier airline any more than most other small Pacific nations. But, with fewer than 12000 people, and most unable to afford to fly anyway, why would Qantas, Air Pacific or anyone else be interested in serving the Island more than on a very occasional basis? (to keep the load factor high, about once a fortnight would probably be about all it could stand with a 737 or A320). And why should the Australian taxpayer prop it up other than by paying whatever has been agreed between Governments in return for the detention of illegal immigrants?
At the moment Air Nauru goes through there a total of four times a week, i.e. two return flights from Australia to Fiji via Nauru. This probably is over-servicing, but because of the lack of medical facilities on Nauru, it is often necessary to get people out for urgent treatment and the fresh produce that goes in on most flights is always welcome. Then there is the employment provided to locals. Sure, Air Nauru is way over-staffed, but the alternative would be to have them on welfare, of which there is none.
Because Air Nauru does regular charter work it is not a complete drain on the country's resources, and with some rationalisation could almost turn a profit. Rationalisation is currently being looked at very seriously.
As for KC talking to aircraft salespeople; he would no doubt be hoping for some 'commission'. Somehow, I think the new boys in Government would be right on to that little lurk. Any aircraft replacement will have to be less dollars than what the current 737-400 is costing, not more. If the rumour said we were getting an old -300 I might almost believe it, but if that was the intention why did they just do a 5 million dollar 'D' check on their -400?.
And, what's more, they paid for the 'D' check.

[ER2nd.]

fruitbatflyer. Great reply but thinking sideways..... it all comes down to money doesn't it . If there was a demand (and real pax ticket money to pay for it) there'd be a service provided by a heap of airlines. The medical bit is indeed the main problem for Nauru - so spend a bit more money resurrecting their own hospital for the services most needed. Yes, yes... I know equip (& staff) is/are expensive. Perhaps the numbers (and type of patients) who needed treatment 'elsewhere' could then be reduced - and are we really talking about a lot of life saving surgical trips that have to be done 'right now'.....or can they be arranged for the (say, on yr estimate) once a fortnight flight. Other than for the Melbourne Empire in good 'ol Oz, the biggest connection for Nauru is with Fiji. Perhaps that connection shd be encouraged with more support from there, not Oz - then only flts to/from Fiji would be required. With just one destination out of Nauru load factors would be satisfactory as all 'traffic' would be going via there - more frequent than present perhaps. Other routes would be hubbed out of Fiji, not Nauru. The main problem has always been where (in whose pocket) the money was going. The tails of past adventures could fill many books I'm sure. The money saved (and perhaps the 'Good Will' SOLD) doing away with Air Nauru ***as it currently is*** could be channelled into creating local employment aimed a reducing their imports. It really isn't that hard to grow a few lettices etc with a bit of soil (get some/make some!!) and water...! ETC...! The power of Oz shdn't be under estimated in 'looking after' a neighbour. We have been propping them up for years - punishment for the rape of their landscape is it not? I am intrigued as to where all this money is suddenly coming from (some backpay to the locals & the required-by-law D Check) - what have 'they' (the new Gov) put on hock to get it? I don't think their 'troups' would have been lucky enough to find any treasures, recently buried out in their desert, do you....! Haveagoodflightback Sunday mate! Enjoy those cold showers won't you.

[amos2]

Good bunch of blokes out there!...or rather,in BNE these days I believe. Good airline,good job,well kept secret!

All of them sought by Virgin, and a lot said no...for good reason!

You blokes still operating the Norfolk charters?

[Pushback]

Bit of in depth conversation going on here.

Fact is Air Nauru is viable and can produce a profit for Nauru with a few schedule alterations.

Why give it to another carrier when the potential is there er2nd?

[ER2nd.]

Yes Pushback....agreed...but what are the real needs of the country? I suggest someone else could do the airline bit (by a deal not as a giveaway - and do it better too) and the money 'returned' frorm its sale(?!) put to better use. With so much money tied up in a venture that really is for the big boys (and pockets especially) it will always be under huge pressures to 'commercially' compete with others 'out there' (now that would be a first too). Others are offering a service (air freight) and pax side could be fixed. It ain't that big a market. Sure a little tinkering may make the books look pretty right on current out/ins but what about down the track? Are the rats out there really likely to leave any good route alone if they think they can make a buck/pound/whatever out of it? They'd quickly start nibbling away at the edges. So then suddenly (again) all that would be left would be a pretty hollow shell of a company. Airlines are expensive toys for well off kids to play with - not Nauru. Again, back to basics....Nauru is a simple, small island community based on one, small mining company. That's it - unless you want to include the recent millions coming form detainee program. If the grand plan mentioned earlier were true (Japan, Honkers, Hawaii - and I see a JAL connection there - anyone follow me?) just what do you suppose the other airlines are going to do to safeguard their interests or investigations of new markets. Sorry Pushback..I have a soft spot for ON too but.....
amos2 Norfolk is still one of their 'charter ops.

[Menen]

Nauru - a simple island community. Yeah - right. Pilots best paid in the Pacific - tax free - government conned into paying the expat pilots Australian income tax - 40 hours a month per pilot if stretched - exotic shapely F/A's - pity about the in-flight service sometimes - Air Nauru staff on the island and other government workers who consider themselves lucky to get paid once evry couple of months or so, 'cos sometimes there is no money to pay them - but pilots always get paid on time. Great job - lots of permanent first officers though. Captains would be crazy to leave that cushy job - that's why they stay living it up in Aussie.:ok:

[ER2nd.]

Lol...Menen. Yup....I picked up on that too. Yr two sentences say it all don't it bud....

[Kwaj mate]

Pushback, have you ever read the budget papers or an accurate the end-of-year report?
Tell me who paid the lease fees or insurance charges and where are they listed.
Menen, yes the Cpatain salaries are a bit much for a single 737-400 to support, as are some of the other expenses. Why would these chaps rock the boat and depart a very well paid, no-tax job.
The mirrors are polished every day and their smoke machines are serviced regularly.

[amos2]

...and "good on em" too!

[evolante]

Anyone care to tell me where I can find a set of accounts for Air Nauru (on the web?)

[ER2nd.]

Evolante you'd be hard pressed to find anything to do with accounts on anything to do with Nauru - anywhere, let alone the web... Maybe things will start to change from now on....

[Misty Air]

Is it Menen or Meneng??:cool:
ON is the only Govt op that has yet to crash and burn,the previous excellent Health and Education systems manned mainly by underpaid expats are no more.Isn't this the same throughout the Third World??:ugh:
I enjoyed my many years of service with RON,but even during the 'golden ' years my pay was less than half an FO's.:(
I know better now and work were I'm paid my worth.Ever asked a teacher or a nurse what the going rate in Dubai is at present??:sad: Boys must have their toys and to hell with the masses.

[ER2nd.]

Misty Air....."Menen" is the palace and Meneng is the district it is in. Well..... "to hell with the masses, etc."....there I cannot agree with you. Also, all things being equal, I find it hard to believe pay as an ex Pat was(still is?) THAT bad. Good luck to all but then the operative word is indeed ALL.

and B4 someone out there picks me up on it...by "palace" I mean "pad" or similar. That's what come of beings semi sarcastic which was unecessary.

[Kwaj mate]

ER2nd. I understand that expat teachers were paid as little as A$15k to $25k.
Indian teachers were paid $8 to $12k.
Doctors were paid $25 to $35k; with Indian medical staff were paid just a little more than their teaching brothers.
What are the pilots paid - did someone mention A$120 to $150k plus their Australian tax paid?
Plus the teachers were allocated houses in the worst part of the Government settlement (teacher's gully) when pilots were in Meneng Terrace or in the NPC settlement.
What do you think?

[ER2nd.]

Kwaj mate... I know what I was paid and so 'know by estimation' what others would have been getting...roughly too. I did see an official, standard pay scale memorandum for ON pilots. Sure A$120-150 plus tax paid doesn't sound quite right (did I really read that in this thread?). Tax is indeed a grey area but as long as one never appears to be in Oz I guess one would never have to pay the taxes - if that duty did fall/still falls/maybe falls on the aircrew to deal with. It all depends on the way the contracts were draw up doesn't it. If I (as a foreigner from another island) for example, were employed by NPC as a phosphate digger I know what level of pay scale I'd be on... and I wouldn't be living in Nauruan style luxury... not that there is such a thing by our standards. Somehow (me thinks) this thread has gotten way off course and a bit personal (to others) too. For my part, all I wanted to suggest was/is maybe the days for Nauru running an airline are long since past....and my reasons why. That was all. It is a shame that some seem to have an axe to grind. I for one have no regrets - I'd do it all again tomorrow if I could......

[deepee]

Hi Misty, glad to hear you're now making a go it, must have got that flying job you'd been after for years;)
As an expat teacher on A$8K,life was not as easy as it should have been,but hey we all did live in Meneng Tce.:cool:

[amos2]

Your not really trying to tell us that you went to Nauru to teach for 8 Grand a year DP, are you?

How stupid do you think we are!?

How stupid are you? The dole is more than that!

[Misty Air]

Yep,life certainly has change since the early 80's .

[G.Khan]

Back in the dark days, (late seventies) as a first year F/O I think I was getting about A$17Kp.a. tax free and accommodation in Menen Terrace provided. All salaries on Nauru in those days appeared in the Government Gazette so there were no secrets.

I was surrounded by NZ teachers in Menen Tce. They usually came as a husband and wife team, both working, tax free etc. but they were able to supplement their low salaries then by each buying a duty-free Japanese car, importing it to NZ, also duty-free and selling it at a considerable profit. Can't remember if they were allowed one car per contract or one per year.

The RON Government paid Australian salaries to the airline but NZ salaries to the teachers, not a popular move amongst the teaching fraternity!

[deepee]

In those 'dark years' a teacher with at least 6 years exp was on A$8K pa tax free.The only perk was that air travel was cheap and ON went almost anywhere with its 6 planes.:p
Am wanting to return to check the place out, maybe sailing there is now the only option:ok:

[Centaurus]

Dunno about the so called Dark Years. Certainly not for the pilots for sure. Apart from occasional vicious office politics where sacking the messenger was elevated to an art form, the Seventies and early Eighties were for Air Nauru pilots the best flying you could ask for. Lots of overnights at good destinations from Honolulu to Hong Kong and average of 40 hours a month - not exactly hard work compared to DJ. All the while the airline was losing tens of millions of dollars. With rich phosphate money In those days it was the original bottomless pit of dollars.

While Australian and NZ teachers were immensely popular with the locals, even though expat salaries for teachers were absymally low by any third world standards, (I can well believe 8K) the rot set in quickly with the arrival of teachers with dubious qualifications from the Indian sub-continent who were paid even less by the RON government at the time. So the Aussies and Kiwis were deported back to their homelands en masse - often on 48 hours notice - and the education standards fell alarmingly - from which they never recovered - and for which the country is now reaping what the government sowed.

[Sal-e]

A good solution is to localise the job as much as possible so as not cost the country the expats' tax which effectively doubles their worth.

[amos2]

A 737 driver with a CPL?

We all know who that is!

When you pay your debts perhaps others may pay theirs!

[Wirraway]

Sat "Weekend Australian"

Judge exposes US Nauru 'deal'
By Cameron Stewart
August 02, 2003

AN Australian court has blocked an attempt by the US to repossess Nauru's only aircraft, an Air Nauru 737, saying it would contravene promises given by Washington to reward Nauru for cracking down on terrorism and for helping smuggle North Korean defectors to the West.

The summary judgment by the Victorian Supreme Court backs claims made by Nauru that the US gave private pledges of financial assistance to the impoverished island in return for abolishing its offshore banking and passport schemes, which Washington claimed were assisting terrorists.

The court's decision is an embarrassment for the US, which has strongly denied making any such promises to Nauru in return for agreeing to crack down on terrorists.

The legal judgment confirms the revelations by The Weekend Australian in April that a shadowy group of well-connected individuals, some claiming to be US intelligence officers, used a mixture of threats and promises to bring Nauru in from the cold in the war on terror.

This same group also asked Nauru to join an intelligence mission, dubbed Operation Weasel, which was to use Nauru's diplomatic facilities in Beijing to help smuggle senior North Korean scientists and military officers to the West.

Letters, documents and emails, obtained by The Weekend Australian, show this group used promises of US aid as a carrot to get Nauru to follow an identical agenda to that of the US State Department.

But when Nauru took the steps asked of it, the US State Department said that any aid promises given to Nauru by private individuals did not have the authority of the US Government and that no aid would be forthcoming.

Nauru decided to test the issue in court after the US Government's export credit agency Eximbank sought last month to repossess the Air Nauru 737 because of loan-payment defaults.

Nauru claimed that Michael Horowitz, a former adviser to president Ronald Reagan, and Joe Pinder, a senior US congressional staffer, were among those who said they would take steps to protect the island's aircraft from US government creditors.

Judge Bill Gillard ruled: "It is open to infer that these men were acting on high executive authority from the US Government.

"The fact that requests were made, which Nauru responded to, and promises were made in the context of these matters, which were of concern to the US Government, does lead, on the material, to the conclusion that the people involved did have the necessary authority of the Government." He said it would be a "grave injustice" if Nauru were not allowed to defend its claims in a trial.

The US State Department has made no comment on the judgement or on the case, which is likely to go to a full trial in Melbourne later this year.

Confidential affidavits given to the court by five Nauruan politicians detailed how their island was recruited for Operation Weasel.

The Supreme Court decision means that, for now, Nauru can keep flying its Air Nauru 737.

===========================================

[Sal-e]

hey amos2, ATPL actually........but wasn't a bad run on 737s on a CPL eh.....9 years to be exact.
Nauru is unable to pay its debts....but the US will pay for the plane and that on its own minus leases etc is making a healthy profit..not much, but profit nonetheless....best damn job in the region, I reckon.