STRAPPED IN TIGHT

FROM THE PRESIDENT – MORRIS TULL

Hi everyone and welcome to the 25/26 season. We have just had our National Aerobatic Championships and held the AGM during that event.

Myself and all the committee were re-elected and we conned Gill Phillips into joining us on the committee, thank you team and we all look forward to organizing and joining you in many aerobatic themed events and competitions.

With the completion of the nationals, that signals the end of the use of 2025 sequences. Grant Benns will take the 2025 IAC sequences and turn them into ours and get them up on the website. The 2025 CIVA free known figures will be used from now to build your own sequences for intermediate and up. The Primary and Recreational sequences don’t change from year to year but we may tweak the known II and Known III. This gives you all 12 months to practice them so no excuses.

A new “Constitution/Rules of Incorporation” were drafted to meet the new laws and it was voted in at the AGM, please take time to read it and learn about our purpose, how our club is governed and how things work if something goes wrong.

Our event procedures manuals are working very well, with only minor changes each season. If you do have any practical ideas on improvements or changes, forward them to me.

I have also updated the NZAC Competition Rules, it is clear many competitors, especially the 4-minute freestyle, have not read the rules to optimize your flight within the limitations of your aircraft and experience. You are leaving points out of possible scores.

I strongly recommend all competitors read the competition rules and the judging criteria at least once a year as this helps you target your techniques and assist if you are on the judging line.

We had a rare event where no competing pilots had to do time on the judging line and as a result, the competition flights flowed very efficiently, so a big thank you to all judges and volunteers.

I am inspired by the enthusiasm of the new members like Gill, Will, Pierre, Iain, and Chris. I thank the instructors in the club for your work to bring on more aerobatic pilots. I definitely appreciate the aircraft owners who generously share their aircraft with other pilots. And I encourage any engineers or builders to help get more great aerobatic aircraft out of workshops and into the sky.

Inspiring the next members and generation is critical to our survival and it was great to be approached by the Masterton Air Training Corp, to come and meet us and look over our planes for an hour at the nationals. I think they had a great visit checking out the coolest aircraft in the country, but I could be biased.

Equally impressive was Gill, Will and Iain setting up a tent at the Hood Aerodrome open day on Sunday the 2nd to advertise our aerobatic club. We now have some information pamphlets to spread around the country in the hope we pick up some more members and competitors.

Going forward, our committee will continue our main purpose to encourage aerobatics at every opportunity by organizing aerobatic events and competitions, spreading the word and assisting with training.

We have moved the Nationals for 2026, one week later to 11-15th March 2026 to de-conflict with the International Shearing competition at Masterton, an especially big event next year. Note your calendars now and get your accommodation booked as there will still be lots of people around the area.

As I head towards retirement, I look forward to participating in more aerobatic and Airshow events, and I hope I can steer the club to more great events that are professional, practical and fun.

If you have any ideas for the club, please contact any of us to move forward with them.

Stay in touch, fly safe, keep learning, but have fun.

ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING 27.02.2025

OPENING REMARKS & WELCOME

Morris Tull, time 2003

APOLOGIES

Trish Stephens, Lachlan Falconer, Lincoln Jones

ATTENDEES

Morris Tull, Andy Love, Russell Bell, Mike Fowler, Dave Cranna, John Ashman, Grant Benns, Iain McPhail, Pierre Pechon, Murray Rogers, Brent, Griffin, Chris Schadler, Richard Wallace, Gill Phillips, William Siakifilo, Martyn Gosling, Darrell Brown, Frank van der Hulst.

MINUTES OF PREVIOUS AGM

Read by Morris Tull

MATTERS ARISING FROM PREVIOUS AGM

NIL.

ADOPTION OF MINUTES

Adopted by Martyn Gosling, seconded by Russell Bell

PRESIDENTS REPORT – Morris Tull

The 2024 Nationals was another safe and great success, we had reasonable weather and got through all the flights except the 4 – minute freestyle. The number of volunteers is a big factor in this, many thanks. We hold the Nationals at this time to avoid cyclonic weather, we may have got lucky this time again.

Excellent to see the new members and aircraft at our events. Welcome and congrats

to all the new aerobatic qualified pilots around, Will, Brad, Holley, who else is new?

I understand the regional events went well with the South Island Akro Fest getting record numbers, well done. Our main roles and time-consuming tasks on the committee are to organise great events for you, and do a few extra update projects each season, we have been trying a different website host but it has not been as easy as hoped and we now plan to refresh our current one and train up a couple of people, if anyone has experience with word press, let us know.

A law change has seen us need to update our constitution wording and it has to be voted on today. We are also working on refreshing our mission statements. Organizationally; we are in a great position with great event templates for future events. Credit to Grant for Procedures Manuals. Big thanks to efforts to train new judges. Big thanks to NZWA for the cooperation and support with our pt 149 app

roved events. Mike Fowler’s tech inputs acknowledged and work to migrate the website, thanks for your time on this.

Thank you to my committee, you have done most of the work with the local events this season. I have proved that you can do a lot from afar just with a computer, experience and guidance. I am looking forward to retirement very soon and being on the same time-zone and location as my aircraft and the committee.

Adopted by Martyn Gosling, seconded by Murray Rogers

VICE PRESIDENTS REPORT – Mike Fowler

The Club have made some great progress over the last year, and I think it is worth celebrating the wins that happen in the background to keep the machine oiled and fuelled:

• Completed 3 competition events (including this Nationals) safely, successfully, and with great flying and enjoyment
• Rules of Incorporation rewritten to align with the new Incorporated Societies Act 2022 which comes into effect over the next year; failure to rewrite to the new standard would see the Club dissolved, so completing the change is critical for our survival
• Our Procedures and toolkits continue to improve through the work of the Contest Directors; Mo, Grant, and Andy especially have been on a path of continuous improvement here
• Created some signage and started some marketing of our club outside of our own events; a small and last-minute result at Warbirds has kicked us into gear to better prepare and attend future events and raise awareness of the sport, Club, and aircraft
• A stack of Aerobatic Club flyers has been dropped across aviation orgs NZ-wide, thanks in huge part to Steve Geard with his stealth arrivals and sneaky drop-offs
• New members coming into the club bringing new skills, energy, and great displays of flying upside down, alongside our solid returning members
• As always, we’ve had amazing support from volunteers – flying pilots, non-flying pilots, locals, partners – some travelling a long way to help out; without these people we can’t have competitions so our thanks to them can’t be overstated.

It’s critical as a club that we don’t stand still; there are lots of ways people can spend their time and money, and if we don’t keep relevant, safe, and fun future members will choose other ways to spend their money, time, and passion.

To that end, there’s a few key topics and projects I’m keen to focus on over the next year to continue our journey of continuous improvement:

1. The 40th Anniversary of the Club’s incorporation – this is a significant milestone and one we should leverage to help raise awareness of our club, promote aerobatics, and help get the next wave of new members inspired to get rated and join in the fun.
2. Gavin Conroy has arranged representation on the flight line at Classic Fighters, we’ll be able to run a manned mini-stand with flyers, discussion, and a gaggle of aerobatic planes on the fence-line to generate interest from the public and hopefully some pilots too.
3. If anybody else has an event they recommend us attending, or can help support a stand at, please let me know and we can work on a plan to spread the word.
4. It might even be of interest to the media, combining the Pitts 80th anniversary with the NZAC 40th could be a “feel good” piece for a slow news day perhaps.
5. Judge training – while we have a solid base of judges it’s always a challenge at the competitions to get enough capable judges to support the competition and provide fair and correct feedback to the competitors after investing so much in aircraft, practice, and time; especially for the higher categories.
6. I’m planning on attending some judge training courses overseas over this next year and see what we can bring home to help everybody step up their judging skills.
7. Working on a more structured, tiered judge training process for NZ to build upon the entry-level camps we’ve run a couple of times with Focus on Objective Judging with accurate application of deductions.
8. Continuous improvement to safety, efficiency, workload, and enjoyment of our competitions, the contest directors of all events are always working to improve the procedures, and the next year will be no different.
9. Our members ultimately make the decisions while PIC that result in our excellent safety record as a club; I don’t foresee any risks to that being maintained as we continue through this event and the next year.
10. Continuing to address Accessibility – while the dedicated aerobatic machines are amazing to watch, they’re not in everyone’s grasp, but that doesn’t mean aerobatics is out for them, any Aerobat can be competitive in the right hands, just ask Gill and Murray.
11. Continuing to encourage flight schools to get their people understanding the whole flight envelope, no matter what the steed, is a key step in building an interest base and a pipeline of future members for us

I’m sure that’s more than enough to fill up the nest year!

Finally, a huge “thank you” to the committee, contest directors, judges, scribes, pilots, helpers, and supportive (or perhaps accepting is a better word?) partners who all volunteer their time and energy to make our sport possible in NZ; it takes a lot to enable what we do to happen, but it is well worth the effort!

Adopted by Martyn Gosling, seconded by William Siakifilio

ANNUAL FINANCIAL REPORT – Andy Love

We have had another solid year of events and new members joining our organization. It remains a challenge to keep our members current year to year. The general pattern, is for members to renew membership so that they can compete. Our financial balance as of the 10th February, is $30,100.00. We have expenses for the Nationals to come out. We are averaging 35-40 current members annually. Between South Island and North Island Akro Fest events, we are seeing a few new members joining each year which is positive. We have continued to build on a solid financial position, which has given us the means to upgrade our equipment as needed like the base radios which have continued to be greatly valued at our events.

If you have any thoughts or suggestions, from a financial perspective, please do not hesitate to contact me. Always keen to hear feedback, good, bad or indifferent.

Adopted by David Cranna, seconded by Iain McPhail

PRESENTATION OF ACCOUNTS – Andy Love

Adopted by Morris Tull, seconded by William Siakifilio

CONTEST DIRECTOR REPORTS

NORTH ISLAND AKRO FEST – Grant Benns

Mercer field – Dee and Neil – been huge support and great for the club.

New locations are great for extending our exposure and hopefully picking up some more competitors.

The North Island Akro Fest; was perhaps a week too close for people to attend both? We managed to do it on the date as planned for the first time in a while.

There was a great battle between Piere and Steve G, with Steve taking away the cup.

Adopted by Morris Tull, seconded by David Cranna

SOUTH ISLAND AKRO FEST – Andy Love

It was awesome getting new pilots coming through, and was a great event. Highlight was hosting founding member, Allen Hogan and his lovely wife Joyce. Allen gave us a fantastic speech on the early days of the club, his background in aviation including a big stint in Australia.

Huge support from SCAC with Alphas availability and support with training. 24 competitors in total. Our biggest issue at Ashburton, is weather. We have already made changes for the next event, to take into account the challenging morning conditions we are finding year to year. We have the best airfield for the event, and great local operators. So, the future for the event is extremely bright.

We will continue to encourage our members coming to this event to take on the ultimate challenge and experience of the Nationals as well. Lachie, Mike, Iain, Richard Button were all huge help to make it happen.

ELECTION OF COMMITTEE

PRESIDENT- MORRIS TULL

Nominated by Martyn Gosling, seconded by John Ashman

VICE PRESIDENT – MIKE FOWLER

Nominated by Morris Tull, seconded by Iain McPhail

TREASURER/SECRETARY – ANDY LOVE

Nominated by Martyn Gosling, seconded by Gill Phillips

COMMITTEE NOMINEES

Grant Benns nominated by Morris Tull, seconded by Mike Fowler

Mike Slack nominated by Morris Tull, seconded by Russell Bell

Lachlan Falconer nominated by Mike Fowler, seconded by William Siakifilio

Steve Geard nominated by Gill Phillips, seconded by Russell Bell

Lincoln Jones nominated by Gill Phillips, seconded by Richard Wallace

Gill Phillips nominated by Andy Love, seconded by William Siakifilio

MOTIONS TO BE PUT TO THE AGM

New rules of Incorporation proposed to the membership. Accepted by all, except Russell who did not receive the correspondence. The Secretary will establish email contact to ensure that the member is receiving emails from the Club

Adopted by Morris Tull, seconded by Iain McPhail

GENERAL BUSINESS

Better comms with Flying NZ, proposed by John Ashman. Considerable progress on this front with Mike and Andy working closely with FNZ and will continue to moving forward.

CLOSING

We encourage our members to give feedback for operations, events, general business. Our members are our club.

Morris Tull proposed AGM complete.

Adopted by Andy Love, seconded by Mike Fowler

Meeting closed 2100

THE AEROBATS CALENDAR

NEW ZEALAND NATIONAL COMPETITION 11-15 MARCH 2026

This is the premium event of the Aerobat’s calendar. We fly over six categories, Primary, Recreational, Sports, Intermediate, Advanced and Unlimited plus a 4- minute Freestyle. The competition is open to everyone (financial NZAC members, that is) who can turn an aircraft upside down and want to fly for fun. Winning is an optional extra.  The sequences for the 2025/26 year we will be flying are available on our website

2025/2026 AVIATION EVENTS CALENDAR

NEED TO KNOW MORE?

President:

Morris Tull
+971506449584. Dubai /WhatsApp.
+642102401094 NZ Mobile when in NZ.
[email protected]

Vice President:

Mike Fowler
027 5111487
[email protected]

Secretary:

Andy Love
021 818816
[email protected]

Useful websites:

• New Zealand Aerobatic Club website: www.aerobatics.nz Great resource of news, events, sequences, rules, and procedures for New Zealand’s aerobatic pilots
• Facebook group: New Zealand Aerobatic Club
• Federation Aviation International: civanews.com This has the Free Knowns manoeuvre catalogue essential for competition flight and international event news
• International Aerobatic Club: www.iac.org There are lots of sequences and information for members of the IAC, it is an offshoot of the EAA.
• NZ Civil Aviation Authority: www.aviation.govt.nz includes vast amounts of information useful to pilots and aircraft owners.
• Biplane Forum: www.BiplaneForum.com where the experts hang out to share a lot of knowledge on all aspects of aerobatic aircraft and maintenance and tips. Search here first for your technical questions.