In brief

Press, 29 September 1988, Page 3

In brief

Sizeable delusion A man, aged 49, who police say claimed to be King of Tonga was arrested, drunk, when he disembarked from an Air New Zealand plane at Tauranga on Tuesday evening. The man, later found to be a bosun who lived in Matapihi, also claimed to be an F. 8.1. agent. Police said they were called to the airport at Mount Maunganui about 8 p.m. after the arrival of the Friendship from Auckland. The man was charged with disorderly behaviour and resisting arrest and he will appear in the District Court at Tauranga on Tuesday. Bail was allowed. — PA. Islanders’ newspaper Auckland’s Pacific Islands community of 90,000 has a new newspaper, “Pacific Press,” a fortnightly Englishlanguage newspaper covering events in the Samoan, Tongan, Cook Island, Niuean, Fijian and Tokelauan communities, as well as news from the Islands. It is the idea of a Fiji-born publisher, Mr Henry Gosling, former manager of the “Fiji Sun” newspaper who spent 15 years with the “South Auckland Courier.” —PA D.S.I.R. jobs to go About 20 D.S.I.R. jobs will disappear after restructuring of the department’s Marine and Soil Research divisions. Staff would be given letters on Monday advising whether they would lose their jobs, said the Director-General of the D.5.1.R., Dr Jim Ellis. Attempts would be made to relocate affected staff but there could be no guarantees, he said. About 20 people would be affected, mostly at the Soil Research Centre at Taita in Hutt Valley. Whale of a view The whale season will soon be under way off the coast of Kaikoura. Nature Watch Charters co-owner, Mr Roger Sutherland, said that during November and December there would be an 80 per cent chance of seeing a sperm whale off the coast. The whales were now about 16km out from the bay and the chance of seeing one was about 50 per cent, he said. “However, the dusky dolphins have returned and a Hector’s dolphin is a certainty,” Mr Sutherland said. There were now about 400 to 500 “duskies” in the bay. “Other certainties on the marine trips are the seals and the seabirds, which can be at times just as great to watch as the whale,” he said. Air fare takes off Hot on the heels of the increases announced this week by Air New Zealand and Ansett New Zealand, Mount Cook Airline fares and freight rates rose 12 per cent at midnight last night. The increase will apply to all of the airline’s routes except between Rotorua, Auckland, and Kerikeri. A 12 per cent increase on. those routes was applied last month. Mount Cook Airline has also followed Ansett’s move to ban smoking on all of its aircraft from October I.PA. Day in the sun Guests on Air New Zealand’s Boeing 767 delivery flight from Seattle were able to enjoy an unexpected extra day in the sun at Honolulu yesterday. As the brand new aircraft, Aranui, was preparing for take-off, the crew found a fault in one of the instruments — the electronic horizontal speed indicator. A replacement part had to be flown to Honolulu from the Boeing factory in Seattle and was being fitted to the aircraft last evening. Aranui is now expected to arrive at Auckland at 6.15 a.m. today, 14 hours late.—NZPA.