The airman

Today we fly thousands of miles in only hours but on August 25, 1920 the first plane crossing of Cook Strait was accomplished.
The crossing was considered wildly turbulent.
It even interrupted the Parliamentary session due that day as people asked if the plane had landed.
And it had. Captain Euan Dickson and his two passengers landed safely at an aerodrome at the Trentham Racecourse.
Dickson went on to establish the first air mail service between the North and South Island.
But it was hardly the most impressive flying feat in Dickson’s history, indeed, compared to his war record, it's usually considered nothing more than a footnote.
Euan Dickson was born on March 31, 1892, to Thomas and Eveline Mary. In 1912 he emigrated to New Zealand and took up a job with an engineering firm in Thames.
But with the advent of war he returned to England to serve in the Royal Navy Air Service and then the Air Force.
Dickson flew 175 raids between May 1917 and August 1918 and won the Distinguished Flying Cross and bar for a raid on a Belgian aerodrome and railway station and for coming to another’s aid when, with all his ammunition gone, he charged 12 hostile enemy fighters to divert their attention.
He is credited with shooting down 14 enemy aircraft.
Captain Dickson was also awarded the French Crois de Guerre for his services during the German offensive from March to July 1918.
After the war he returned to New Zealand and began work for the Canterbury Aviation Company where he hired one of the Avro 504K biplanes for the Cook Strait crossing.
With him were the company’s deputy chairman C H Hewlett and mechanic J E Moore. He also took a mailbag, leaving from Sockburn at 7am.
They refuelled in Kaikōura and after a cup of tea and a bit of cake they were on their way again, this time to Blenheim for lunch.
As they flew over Wellington, their course took them right over the central city, and they could see people pouring out of the buildings to watch - including the suited figures from Parliament.
They even flew over the plane of Auckland pilots George Bolt, Richard Russell and Vivian Walsh - who were in Wellington planning to attempt the Cook Strait crossing the very next day.
The actual flight time was four hours and 57 minutes.
Now it is routinely done in well under an hour.
Captain Dickson died in Auckland on March 10, 1980 aged 87. He was cremated at Purewa Cemetery and his ashes scattered.