This flew over today. Very noisy. Headed over towards Banks Peninsula. It’s a two rotor helicopter.
I have tried to work out what type this is. A couple of NZ operators have Kaman K-Max choppers in NZ which are a tandem rotor type. However this one doesn’t appear to meet the physical appearance of the K-Max I have seen in photos.
bluebus tells me it is a Kamov KA32. This is a Russian helicopter first built in 1969. As it transpires, this one went onto the Araon (see posting below). MRC Aviation Blog records that it was shipped to NZ through Ports of Auckland and flew down from Ardmore yesterday to the ship where it has been hangared on board for the next trip to Antarctica, along with a Squirrel. The Araon has now left Lyttelton – I don’t know when, but last night the webcam showed the berth is empty. The BBC Ems is due in late tonight and as mentioned earlier will be here for just one day loading up to go to McMurdo.
