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The accident plane, ZK-NZP coming in to land at Heathrow Airport, 08 April 1976 - Source: Werner Fischdick
The aircraft operating Air New Zealand flight TE901 on 28 November 1979 was an intercontinental DC10-30 (ZK-NZP) brought into service by Air New Zealand in December 1974. At the time of the accident, it was just under 5 years old and had accumulated 20,763 hours of flight time.
ZK-NZP was the 182nd off the assembly line in Long Beach, California and was the fourth of eight DC10-30's delivered to Air New Zealand.
Air New Zealand decided to order only the intercontinental series 30 DC-10s, which provided additional benefits to the airline, such as:
- Longer range
- Cheaper landing fees (the rear centre gear was retractable)
- Lower operating costs than a four-engined aircraft
- Ability to carry more freight.
ZK-NZP was the first of Air New Zealand's DC-10s to be powered by three General Electric CF6-50C engines, each capable of producing 51,000 pounds of thrust. The first three DC-10s delivered to Air New Zealand had the GE CF6-50A engines, but they were all later fitted with the newer GE CF6-50C.
The first delivery of a DC-10 to Air New Zealand was made in
early 1973.
For more information
visit the NZALPA Erebus website
