Emerald Airport Based Advance Aviation Group Placed in Administration - Aircraft Grounded - Jobs Lost

Word surfaced this week that Emerald Airport-based Advance Aviation Group has been placed in Administration with the reported loss of as many as 15 jobs.  It appears the general aircract charter and maintenance company ceased trading early last week.

One report suggested that Advance Aviation had been in financial trouble from as far back as two years when it was placed in receivership, although it continued to trade under a 'scheme of arrangement'.  This time however, it appears to be more permanent.

Indeed the Advance Aviation fleet of aircraft remain grounded at Emerald Airport with the vital air freight link from Longreach and Barcaldine in the Central West to Emerald and beyond now being flown by a General Aviation Maintenance (GAM) AeroCommander 500-S.

Advance Aviation was born out of Central Highlands Air Transport (CHAT) which I can recall operating as far back as the 1990s.  The company has been head-quartered at Emerald Airport and at last count operated a fleet of eight aircraft - three Piper PA-31 Navajos VH-BCQ, VH-LWW and VH-FWJ, Piper PA-32s VH-LPW and VH-MSR, Cessna 210 VH-TQC, Beech B58 Baron VH-FLZ and Cessna 208 VH-FLL.

VH-FLL was only a recent acquisition (March 2014) and has been noted flying around all parts of Australia and some parts of the South Pacific and Asia on aerial survey flights.

File photo

Sad to see what I thought was a professional and well-run organisation finish up.  My thoughts are with the workers at Advance Aviation of which I personally know and have known a couple of pilots over the past few years.