AIR TRANSPORT

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXXII, Issue 21802, 27 August 1945, Page 2

AIR TRANSPORT

N.Z. PARTICIPATION COMMANDER’S TRIBUTE TEAMWORK A FEATURE (P.A.) WELLINGTON, Aug. 2V. Interviewed on Saturday, Air Marshal the Hon. Sir Ralph Cochrane, K.8.C.8., A.F.C., air officer commanding R.A.F. Transport Command, who was New Zealand’s first chief air staff and who has occupied his present position since early this year expressed pride at having been associated with the R.N.Z.A.F., which had developed into such a splendid organisation.

Speaking of the many New Zealanders in Transport Command, he said they made excellent pilots and possessed those qualities of which New Zealand was justly proud. Team work had been a feature both of the initial development of the R.N.Z.A.F. and in its actual part in the war. Air Marshal Cochrane said he was not in a position to comment on various aspects of post-war civil aviation, which was largely a matter of policy and had been complicated by the sudden ending of the war. Asked what he considered the main essential in a transport pilot, Air Marshal Cochrane said he thought a good sense of responsibility, based, of course, on the fundamentals of physical fitness and mental alertness, was most important and that was a quality possessed in a marked degree by New Zealand airmen.

Future of Rongatai

Air Marshal Cochrane gave an emphatic denial to a statement attributed to him some time ago on the question of the future of Rongotai airport. “I have expressed no opinion of any sort about Rongotai since I sat as a member of the commission appointed by the Government to consider the future of the airport,” he said. “Nor have I ever given any indication of the nature of the commission’s report.” Air Marshal Cochrane, who has been making a routine tour of Transport Command formations in the Middle East. India. Burma and Australia, leaves New Zealand on Monday afternoon for Australia en route to the United Kingdom.