Duane Emeny (left) is taking over from his father, Craig Emeny, as chief executive of Air Chathams. Photo / Jason Oxenham
After 40 years at the helm, Air Chathams founder Craig Emeny is officially handing over the captain’s seat to his son, Duane Emeny.
Craig Emeny announced he was stepping down from his role as chief executive of Air Chathams on June 30, with Duane taking over from July 1.
Craig will remain a co-owner, alongside his wife Marion, and Duane now owns a quarter share in the business.
Craig will also remain on the Air Chathams board as a committee member.
Craig founded the air service in 1984 – the same year Duane was born.
He first went to the Chatham Islands as a pilot in 1982, aged 25, and started the airline to connect the Chatham Islands and Pitt Island to the mainland.
Craig was proud of what he had achieved as founder and chief executive.
“It’s been everything I’ve done all of my life, I am very satisfied that I’ve had the privilege of being able to do what I’ve done,” he said.
“I’ve been able to start an airline that is based in the Chatham Islands that has grown to meet all the islands’ needs and grown to support the people of Whanganui, Kāpiti, Whakatāne and Tonga.
“It’s been a really good journey.”
Craig was confident in Duane’s ability to lead the business.
“He’s really been doing a lot of the CEO roles for the last seven or eight years,” Craig said.
“He understands the business as well as you possibly could so it’s been a great privilege working with Duane.
“It’s time for him to lead and time for me to support, really.”
Duane said he felt ready to adopt the title of chief executive, after being “indoctrinated into the business” from an early age.
“From 5 years old, I was telling people that I wanted to work at Air Chathams, be a manager and be a pilot – which I have certainly done for 20 years,” Duane said.
“It’s been my life as well, which I’ve loved, so it’s pretty cool to get to manage the whole business.”
Duane was proud of what his father had managed to create
“It’s incredible really, isn’t it? If you look in the history books of New Zealand aviation, there’s not many, in fact I don’t think there’s any, fully privately-owned airlines set up in the ‘80s that are existing today,” he said.
“To go through what Air Chathams has, including direct competition with Air New Zealand for a period of time, is pretty impressive so there’s big shoes to fill.”
Air Chathams is training a staff member to fill Duane’s previous role as head of flight operations and expects them to be ready in two to three months.
In the meantime, Craig will step into that role.
Duane’s focus as chief executive is to continue to provide air services for communities that need connecting and look at where the business could use further investments.
“For me, the focus is on the things that we do really well. We’ve built a business by meeting the community’s needs.
“I think that’s a strong focus – to remember where we fit well, don’t step into the spaces of others that are larger and are working at scale.
“That’s why we’ll be doing a lot of advocacy work with Government. There’s a lot of growth in that regional space, there’s a lot of airports and air routes that aren’t being served or are underserved currently.
“I think if the settings are right then airlines like us can really do good in that space.”
Duane was also keen to progress with discussions with the Whanganui District Council on potentially moving its operations and maintenance base to Whanganui.
“The ball is really in the council’s court as to whether they want to put up an offer that would be fairly compelling to a business like us and prompt us to consider a move there,” Duane said.
“The economy there is in good shape so it would be a reasonably safe bet to make some further investment there in terms of where we might consider basing our operations and maintenance facilities.”
Duane said he understood councillors may be wary about further investment in aviation with the recent New Zealand International Commercial Pilot Academy issues.
He was keen to make progress on expanding Air Chathams’ service by providing a route from Whanganui to Christchurch, which he said the community had urged the airline to consider.
Air Chathams was continuing to work with the senior leadership team at Air New Zealand to improve regional connectivity.
An interline agreement would allow customers to book Air Chathams connecting flights through Air NZ, creating one itinerary and eliminating the need to recheck luggage.
Duane said further financial support from the Government was needed.
“I think we are leaving a massive opportunity at the door by not having any mechanism driven by central government to support regional activity,” he said.
“It’s done all around the world in first-world countries where they actively support and fund regional flight activity to more remote places – for whatever reason, New Zealand doesn’t seem to think they need to do that.
“If you look at the loss of flight route capacity and flight routes in general, especially for some of these smaller ports, with the right settings and support at a central government level that could have been preventable.”
It was ultimately the communities that lost in those situations, Duane said.
“Whanganui is the perfect example. Had Air Chathams not stepped in [when Air NZ pulled out] then everyone would have to drive away from town to fly and eventually, over time, that’s going to drive all sorts of decisions about where people choose to live and invest into new business.
“I think it’s just about having that long-term view and that’s what we don’t do well in New Zealand.”