Cook Govt Limits Length Of Airstrip

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 32120, 16 October 1969, Page 11

Cook Govt Limits Length Of Airstrip

(Ji Z. Pre«t Association) WELLINGTON, Oct 14. The Cook Islands Government will not allow New Zealand to build a jet airstrip at Raratonga longer than 7500 ft. This was revealed in Parliament tonight by the Minister of Transport (Mr Gordon) during debate on the estimates for airport development He had been questioned by the Deputy Leader of the Opposition (Mr Watt) on the Government’s decision to build the Rarotonga jet strip 1000 ft shorter than Mangere. The decision to build a 7500-foot airstrip, said Mr Watt appeared very shortsighted as the Government was spending millions of dollars on an airport which according to information which he had did not allow it to fit into the whole complex of servicing the Pacific and North America. Mr Watt said that information given to him indicated that the planned strip would not be long enough to enable fully-loaded Air New Zealand | DCSs to fly to the North American mainland.

He also asked what would be the additional cost of extending the runway to the iength of Mangere and sug-

gested it would be wiser to do this now rather than later so that Rarotonga airport would conform with the complex of Pacific airways routes. Mr Gordon replied that the planned 7500-foot airstrip could take DCSs and Boeing 707 s with exactly the same

load as they left from Auckland to go to Tahiti, Samoa, and Honolulu—the points to which the planes would be authorised to travel. The Minister said that in negotiations with the Cook Islands Government on construction of the airstrip the Cook Government stipulated that 7500 ft was the maximum length it was prepared to allow.

“At this particular point of time this is the maximum strip we can build,” he declared.

New Zealand could not buld an airstrip of any other length without over-riding the independence of the Cook Islands Government

He hoped that as the economy of the Cook Islands expanded from the tourist boom and other economic developments which the airport would bring, the Cook Government would agree to extending the airport.