Coral Route Costs

Teal Report

Coral Route Costs NZ £58,000

TEAL lost £58,000-odd on the Coral Route in 1955-56, and this loss would have been much higher had the service been confined to Western Samoa and the Cook Islands, for which it was originally planned, says the company's annual report.

This loss is not taken into account when arriving at TEAL's overall profit as the NZ Government pays for the cost of operating the Coral Route beyond Fiji.

The French Oceania extension, traditional lure to tourists, continues to increase. Passen gers carried on the Coral Route increased by more than 18 per cent, even though Satapaula Marine Airport in Western Samoa was closed for a period. A total of 2,604 passengers was carried during the year.

The report gives no hint for future plans for the Coral Route except to say that it can be maintained with the present flying boats for only a few years more.

"Unless New Zealand, which alone supports this route, is willing to abandon air transport in this area, a policy decision in airport development is necessary," the report reads.

Perhaps this is a hint to the Governments of Western Samoa and Tahiti to get moving quickly to develop airfields which will accom modate airliners at least as big as a DC6. [The Solent flying-boat at present operating the Coral Route will probably have to be re placed in 1959.] As the report deals only with the 12 months to March 31, 1956, there is naturally no mention of the tremedous amount of traffic carried on the route in the winter of 1956, and in the few weeks before and immediately after the Olympic Games.

Dealing with the Hibiscus Route (Auckland- Nadi) the report says that the growth of tourist business to Fiji, which had been hastened by TEAL's promotional activities, was largely responsible for an increase of more than 13 per cent, in the traffic carried between the two countries.

In spite of the competition of two other airlines operating a total of four flights weekly, TEAL, with a frequency of two flights a week, carried nearly three-quarters of the total local passenger movement between New Zealand and Fiji.

Dealing with the Norfolk Island service the report says that TEAL started a service with chartered Skymasters on November 6, 1955.

"Incidentally, the frequency of the service was weekly but this was experimental since there was doubt whether the present traffic to and from the island could justify it," the report says.

"In its first five months the service up lifted a total of 429 passengers and 17,376 kgs. of cargo. (The weekly frequency was sustained until the Norfolk Island Centennial Celebrations in June, 1956, but thereafter it became fortnightly).

"A worthwhile increase in passenger traffic and hence in frequency of communication be tween New Zealand and Norfolk Island depends upon local hotel development on the island.

Due to the proximity of sub-tropical Norfolk Island to New Zealand, and consequently a low round-trip fare, hotel development would result in a well-patronised air service."

FOOTNOTE: TEAL made a net profit of £63,338 during 1955-56 on its services other than Coral Route. ff Mr. Richard Barrett Lowe, formerly Governor of Eastern Samoa, has now taken up his new appointment as Governor of Guam.