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 | Grant Kenny soaring to new heights
The Curry Kenny Aviation Group has made its second major local acquisition
for 2007, buying leading Caloundra Airport-based helicopter maintenance company
Helicent.
Picture : SMH.com.au |
The deal follows the group’s purchase in February of training company
Chopperline, also based at the airport.
Helicentre was founded by David Miles and Gary Castle in 1992. The business
employs about 30 staff and is the biggest helicopter maintenance facility on the
Sunshine Coast with contracts to maintain Bell, MD, Robinson and Schweizer
choppers. Helicentre also sells spare parts to the Australian Army and New
Zealand Air Force, and also has maintenance contracts with the Australian
Navy.
The purchase will elevate Curry Kenny Aviation Group to a leading position in
helicopter ownership, maintenance, training and contract charters in
Australia.
“We’re pretty excited to be selling the business to Grant given the strength
of his business,” Mr Castle said.
News of the deal has co-incided with the launch tomorrow night of a Sunshine
Coast aviation directory at the regional airport at Maroochydore.
The event, called Blue Sky Thinking, will include presentations on the
Sunshine Coast Airport master plan and prospects for the aviation industry in
the region going forward.
Despite the name of the event, many industry operators are concerned about
the future, listing a shortage of space at the Sunshine Coast Airport and the
flagged closure of Caloundra Airport in December 2014 as dark clouds hovering
overhead.
The directory will be launched by the Sunshine Coast Aviation Working Party,
formed 12 months ago to promote business opportunities within the industry
locally.
Since then, members have expanded the focus Australia-wide, and have also
identified the major issues facing operators, with the closure of Caloundra at
the head of the list.
Working party spokesperson Tank McPherson, managing director of Queensland
Institute of Aviation Engineering, also based at Caloundra Airport, said “we’ve
accepted it’s going to happen, what we want to know is what the future
holds”.
“I want to expand my own business but I can’t because of the uncertainty,” he
said.
“Bells Creek (south of Caloundra) has been put forward as an alternative, but
is that the right area to go to?”
Rob Rich, Curry Kenny Aviation Group business development manager, said the
state government was supposed to have finalised a report in June on the future
use of airports in Queensland.
“It’s been put on hold, so the operators (at Caloundra) just don’t know what
their future will be,” he said.
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