Ace top dresser living the dream in Hawke's Bay

Scott Dunkerley in the cockpit during a day's work aerial top dressing west of Napier. Photo / Paul Taylor

When Scott Dunkerley says he's living the dream it's not hard to see why – evidence the view from the window across the green grass to the snow on the Kaweka Range and not a cloud in the sky.

That's Friday, out past Sherenden of the Taihape road on Friday morning, and on Thursday afternoon, he'd been at Trelinnoe Station near Te Pohue, with a backdrop of the extensive gardens.

It seems almost lost in the morning that he's miles from nowhere, it's barely 7.30am, he's been up since the alarm went at 5am and he's been at work since less than an hour later.

The icing on the cake is that the 33-year-old, Australia-born, Napier dad-of-two and Aerospread aerial top dressing ace is also the New Zealand Agricultural Aviation Association's emerging pilot of the year, almost the way it as always going to be for a guy whose father and grandfather were also pilots.

In what he reckons was a situation of being "stitched-up", he received the award at a dinner during the NZAAA annual conference last month, thinking he was only there for the meeting and the social engagement.

He had no idea until they started reading out a citation prepared by general manager Kent Karangaroa, starting: "Our candidate 2022 – Born in Sydney, a Kiwi mum and Aussie dad."

He already had what had been described to him, when working in Manawatū and just appointed to the Hawke's Bay job, as the best job in the industry.

It's the climate that caps it, and so long as there's no wind there's work most days – Saturdays, Sundays, public holidays and birthdays if needed - flying in and out of the remote airstrips with sometimes often a minute to 90 seconds loading on the ground in the company Cresco 750, with work ranging from single-property jobs dropping up to 250 tonnes in a day to three to four jobs a day about the countryside.

Living and flying the dream, at work. Scott Dunkerley in action around the countryside of Trelinnoe and Te Pohue. Photo / Paul Taylor

Days off can at times be only because "the weather's crap", but he makes time for the duckshooting season and hunting, and of course his wife and children Willa, 1, and Frankie, 3, at home.

Growing up in Coffs Harbour, Sydney, he moved to New Zealand aged about 13, and left school at 16 for a job in the forestry, with the sole purpose of funding his pilot training and licensing.

He bought a share in a Cessna 180, and used it to get his hours up, and pursue the passion for hunting, and by 2014, via Motueka to do his "commercial" while working on farms as a shepherd, fencing, shearing and building, to continue self-funding his study.

After a short period flying in tourism in the north he entered the agricultural flying industry as a loader driver biding the time before spotting the opportunity in Hawke's Bay and in early 2018 he was starting with mentor Bruce Peterson starting his Type rating in the Cresco, achieving his Grade 2 qualification at the end of the year

Under the supervision and guidance of Peterson over the next two years he completed his 1000 hours to have his Grade 1 signed last December.

Crucial in the job is the role of the loader driver, in this case Glen Windelev Jamie Howes, the type of role obvious Dunkerley works in and out of the airstrip and surrounding countryside near Te Pohue.

"Can't do without them," he says. "Have to trust they give you the right weights of fertiliser and keep the loader trucks in good working order to make the day go smoothly."

He describes the whole day as "being like a game of rugby", the plan can change in a flash, or a gust, and he's mindful that every 12 months he has to pass a medical, and the day could one day come where he has to look at something else, like farming or building…but he's not thinking about it being any time soon.