Broken down air force plane costs army $120,000

11.45am

A broken-down air force plane cost the army more than $120,000 when it had to fly 29 soldiers back from Canada on commercial flights.

Some of the soldiers were exercising with Commonwealth troops in late June and others were in Canada as part of the New Zealand programme to buy 105 new light armoured vehicles (LAV IIIs) at a cost of $677 million.

The Borealis exercise included troops from America, Canada, Britain and Australia and included a combined interoperability demonstration.

The LAV IIIs are being built at the General Motors factory in Ontario and the army team was in Canada to learn operational aspects of the vehicles.

The New Zealand troops were due to return to New Zealand on an air force Hercules on June 26 but it broke down and spent at least two weeks on the ground in Canada, waiting for spare parts from New Zealand.

Last month the air force admitted No 40 Squadron was in crisis when its five Hercules C130H and the two Boeing 727s were all broken down or in service at the same time and it was unable to put any of the ageing and increasingly unreliable aircraft in the air on two days.

The soldiers returned on commercial flights between July 1 and July 3 and the $120,600 cost covered international air fares and domestic air travel in Canada and New Zealand.

Army spokesman Major Kendall Langston said some officers from both contingents held senior appointments and had commitments.

The air force also faced additional costs to keep its crews on the ground in Canada as they waited for engine spares from New Zealand.

The Hercules and the Boeings are very old aircraft by international military standards. The Hercules were first introduced in New Zealand in 1965 and the Boeings were bought second-hand in 1981.

The Government has yet to decide if it will replace or upgrade the Hercules although many believe an upgrade is the most likely option, which will give them another 15-20 years of life.

The upgrade could cost up to $170m but replacing the five Hercules could cost more than $800m.

The cost of the urgent replacement of the Boeings could be up to $200m.

- NZPA

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