Cessna 200 Series Autumn fly-in and More at Whitsunday Airport at Airlie Beach

I made trip to and from Airlie Beach over the weekend, and popped into the Whitsunday Airport (WAVE) on Saturday 21 April to have a look at the participants that had flown in for the Cessna 200 Series Autumn fly-in.

Most participating aircraft were parked on a grass allotment on the opposite side to the terminal facilities at the airport. Here I took photos of:

Blackall-based Cessna 210 VH-CRL

South Australian-based Cessna 210 VH-OAT

Gold Coast-based Cessna 210 VH-NPL

Sunshine Coast-based Cessna 210 VH-TIU

Roylen Cruises Mackay Cessna 206 VH-IEG

Piper PA-28-140 VH-MFV from the Sunshine Coast was also part of the fly-in

Near one of the resident houses at WAVE (which usually does contain a Cessna 210!) was Cessna 182 VH-OBF of Flight One Services at Archerfield

Elsewhere at the airport I managed to snap three West Australia based Amateur-built ultralight aircraft that were flying around Australia.

The aircraft - Van's RV-8A's VH-OTG and VH-VSW, as well as Glasair SH-2FT VH-THK - all departed together bound for Townsville.

Adelaide-based Cessna 525 Citation CJ1 VH-TFW has arrived from its home base on Friday 20 April. Airport staff told me there was another Cessna Citation Bizjet due to the airport later on Saturday, however I wasn't able to source any definite information on this.

One other notable arrival on Friday 20 April which was still parked at the airport was this striking yellow Western States Holding Sportsman GS-2, which had reportedly stopped into the airport while on a delivery flight from the United States. Indeed the aircraft wears the American registration of N666GM.

One other notable highlight of the day was local seaplane operator Air Whitsunday was celebrating its 39th birthday. They were even offering $39 local scenic flights - unfortunately I missed out - however I did manage to take a couple of photos of Cessna 208FP Caravan Float Plane VH-PGT taxi and depart on a scenic flight.

Skydive Airlie Beach Gippsland GA-8 Air Van VH-RTS was again operating regular parachute drops over the airfield.

The operator of Skydive Airlie Beach even showed me the 'remains' of his Cessna 182 VH-JOU which made a crash landing near the Whitsunday Airport some weeks ago.

A blog post about the incident can be found HERE - although the owner of the aircraft did suggest to me quite strongly that the pilot of VH-JOU on the fateful day was 100% to blame for the incident in which the aircraft ran out of fuel on a ferry flight from Townsville to the Whitsunday Airport.

Lastly, Jimi L was lucky to catch a recently imported Robinson R-66. The chopper registered VH-UXU was snapped outside local Robinson specialist and dealer HeliBiz.

It was certainly well worth the 800km round trip!