Newmans Air
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| Founded | 1984 | ||||||
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| Ceased operations | 1987 | ||||||
| Operating bases | Christchurch | ||||||
| Fleet size | 4 | ||||||
| Destinations | Ashburton, Auckland, Rotorua, Christchurch, Mount Cook-Glentanner, Queenstown | ||||||
| Parent company | Newmans Group | ||||||
Newmans Airways Limited, trading as Newmans Air, was a wholly owned airline subsidiary of Newmans Group (most well known as the owners of Newmans Coach Lines) and served the New Zealand domestic market between 1985 and 1987. It was set up in direct competition with Mount Cook Airline to serve tourist routes. In 1986 Ansett Australia purchased a 50% shareholding, increasing this to 100% in 1987 when the airline was rebranded Ansett New Zealand.
In 1983 Newmans Group had launched a takeover bid for competing tourist company, Mount Cook Group, then still independently owned. Their reasons for wishing to buy the airline was to make more revenue from overseas passengers, instead of simply feeding them to Mount Cook's air operation. They also claimed that Mount Cook's HS 748 aircraft we no longer up to the standards expected by overseas tourists with Newmans intending to re-equip their airline with either De Havilland Canada Dash 7 or BAe 146s.
After their failed attempt, Newmans decided to set up their own competing airline, operating the same tourist routes operated by Mount Cook Airline, but excluding Northland. The airline was launched in only 9 months, with launch celebrations at Rotorua Airport on February 12, 1985.
Services began on February 13, 1985 after a launch celebration in Rotorua the day before. There were three flights a day between Christchurch and Queenstown, two between Christchurch and Rotorua and a single midday flight from Rotorua to Auckland. Stops at Glentanner were added to the Queenstown flights a few months later.
Newmans Air chose to start operations using DHC-7, although only Glentanner actually required an aircraft with short takeoff and landing (STOL) capabilities. Newmans Air planned to move these aircraft into a feeder role serving Wanaka, Te Anau and the West Coast once traffic had built up sufficiently on the 'trunk' services to allow DC9 or BAe 146 aircraft. Newmans also stated intentions to include Nelson (where Newmans Group was based) in its network using a third leased DHC-7, but neither of these plans eventuated.
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Wikipedia