New Zealand PM travels to China on two planes hoping to fly at least one

On Sunday, New Zealand leader Chris Hipkins flew with a business delegation to China, New Zealand’s largest and most important trading partner. At the same time, two planes took off from Wellington at once. But not because of the size of the delegation or the importance of China to New Zealand businesses. It’s just that New Zealand has very old planes, and there’s no guarantee that one of them won’t break down.

New Zealand Prime Minister Chris Hipkins flew two planes to meet with Chinese leader Xi Jinping. On one of the Boeing 757 of the Royal New Zealand Air Force, the head of government and members of the delegation flew, and no one flew on the second. He flew out of Wellington just in case the former had technical problems.

The opposition immediately accused Mr. Hipkins of not caring about the environment at all. It’s like “if someone drove a Ford Ranger 606 times in New Zealand,” said David Seymour, leader of the Libertarian ACT party.

The prime minister’s office was quick to explain: “It was considered that having a spare aircraft was a justified measure so that our mission to the largest trading partner would be successful.”

And the prime minister really had reasons for such an unusual decision. The fact is that squadron No. 40, the services of which the country’s prime minister uses, operates two Boeing 757-2K2 aircraft. These are the same Boeing 757-200s that have been produced since the 1980s and ceased production back in 2004. The Royal New Zealand Air Force purchased the aircraft in 2003 from the Dutch low-cost airline Transavia, and by that time they had already flown for almost 10 years. In other words, these planes are not just old, but very old.

In favor of the decision of Chris Hipkins is a long list of cases when high-ranking politicians in New Zealand had problems with a flight due to technical malfunctions of the aircraft. Last year, then Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern was stranded in Antarctica when her transport C-130 broke down. She had to fly home on an Italian plane. Prior to that, during a visit to the United States, her plane broke down in Washington, and she had to fly away on a commercial flight.

In the same 2022, Defense Minister Peeni Henare and a delegation of 30 people who were stuck for a while in the Solomon Islands suffered from technical problems.

Finally, in 2016, then-Prime Minister John Key was stuck overnight in the Australian city of Townsville after a Boeing 757 carrying a trade delegation to India broke down. They were followed by a second plane, but the visit to India was eventually cut short by a day.

“The 757s are nearly 30 years old, nearing the end of their useful lives and due for replacement between 2028 and 2030,” a spokesman for Chris Hipkins said. However, talks about replacing two old Boeing 757-200s have been going on for several years. And it was originally assumed that they would retire in 2021.

Kirill Sarkhanyants