A significant milestone for a major event this week when tickets finally go on sale to New Zealand’s premier airshow – Warbirds Over Wanaka International Airshow.
The biennial event was last held in 2018 attracting some 55,000 visitors over three days and pumping $42million into the regional economy.
In March 2020 the airshow was one of the first major events in New Zealand to cancel because of Covid. Two years later the event suffered the same fate. “
They say timing is everything and it was just our bad luck to get caught at the very start and the very end of the pandemic restrictions,” says Warbirds Over Wanaka general manager Ed Taylor.
“By the time Easter 2024 rolls around our organisation will have had to survive six years with no ticket revenue. We have only managed to stay in business through the generosity of our amazing funders, sponsors and individual supporters,” says Ed.
Ed says there is definitely an appetite for airshows following the Covid disruptions over the past few years. A recent New Zealand Warbirds Association airshow at Ardmore Airport near Auckland saw a 20 per cent increase in the number of visitors compared with their previous event.
“If our tour group and other booking enquiries are anything to go by we are going to have a bumper crowd come next Easter,” says Ed.
The first significant aircraft to be confirmed for the airshow is the last surviving Royal New Zealand Air Force P-51D Mustang in the country. The aircraft, which hasn’t flown since 1957, has been under restoration by Brendon Deere at Ohakea for more than two years and is on target to make its airshow debut at Wanaka next Easter.
Other major new aerial acts from both New Zealand and overseas will be announced over the coming months as they are confirmed.
On the ground a significant new attraction is also planned. The Future of Aviation Exhibition will feature the likes of New Zealand’s first electric aircraft and an autonomous electric air taxi along with companies exploring the use of solar, hydrogen and other propulsion technologies.
“There is so much going on in the aviation industry aimed at tackling the effects of climate change and we’ve had a huge response from companies wanting to show our visitors first hand what’s happening,” says Ed.
