Pilot trainees up in air after liquidation

A liquidator is negotiating the potential sale of Tauranga's only flight school after it suddenly closed just before Christmas.

About 20 staff at Bay Flight Aviation and nearly 60 pilot students, a third from overseas, are in limbo awaiting the outcome of the negotiations.

The students would have to complete their courses at other training centres in the country if the sale of the Bay's biggest flight school isn't concluded.

Owner Steve Rowe, who lives in Palmerston North, placed Bay Flight into voluntary liquidation on December 22, 2011 citing trading difficulties resulting from lack of flying because of the weather conditions.

"The weather over the past six months has been shocking and we got behind hundreds of hours on flying [contracts]," Mr Rowe said. "For instance, in October we got through 300 hours flying and we should have done 1000 hours.

"Some of the students from the Middle East were on time lines for employment back home and we couldn't honour the [training] commitment. They only got halfway through their instrument ratings," he said.

"Even on days when they got up in the air, clouds were hemmed in around the Kaimais and they couldn't get away on the cross-country flights. That didn't help us."

Mr Rowe said it was such a shame to close the operation.

"We had students lined up ready to come from the Middle East and India. All the right signs were there, but for various reasons I decided to put it into liquidation."

The shareholders, Mr Rowe and his wife, Sandra, declined to put in any more capital, and running it remotely from Palmerston North didn't help.

"But that wasn't the main reason. There was something in behind the scenes that I don't want to talk about. I was personally gutted, and when things outside your control occur you have to move on," Mr Rowe said.

The liquidator from RHB Chartered Accountants has met Bay Flight staff (there are 16 instructors) and students in the past week, telling them a sale process was under way. The new owner needs to be NZQA accredited and registered.

RHB director Tom Rodewald said he hoped to have a conditional contract in the next day or so and settlement next week.

"The students prefer to stay in Tauranga and, fingers crossed, we can have a good resolution," he said.

The visiting students pay about $70,000 for the 15-month flying course and spend another $20,000 on accommodation, food and hospitality, adding more than $3million to the Tauranga economy.

Mr Rowe, who bought the business at Tauranga Airport 18 months ago, invested up to $1.5million. He doubled the number of students, expanded into an adjacent hangar, built two new classrooms and added a $140,000 United States-made Redbird flight simulator. Mr Rowe bought a $700,000 four-seater, twin-engine Tecnam from Italy, complete with a glass cockpit and the latest digital instrumentation - the only one of its type in the country.

He also upgraded his 11-strong fleet by buying new engines from the US.

Bay Flight, which was established by Phil Hooker in 1996, became the only training centre in Tauranga after Euro Flight International closed and Air Discovery retrenched back to Auckland early last year.