What's on at Air Force Museum of New Zealand
Latest from the museum
Latest Exhibition
Tall Tails
Our Tall Tails exhibition features the mounted tails of the C-130 Hercules and P-3 Orion, this new exhibition brings visitors closer to two extraordinary aircraft and the stories they carry. It also highlights the importance of finding a permanent home for them, as the Museum continues to fundraise through the Home for Heroes project.
Tall Tails is on display in our Thérèse Angelo Wing.
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Exhibition
The Mighty Hercules
The Mighty Hercules exhibition is on in the Cochrane Gallery upstairs in our atrium. Come and visit and learn all about this extraordinary aircraft.
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Support Us
Home for Heroes
Join us in building a forever home for New Zealand’s C-130 Hercules and P-3 Orion – icons of service.
For more than half a century, these legendary aircraft carried our nation’s courage across the world – in peace, crisis, and discovery. Now, they need a home worthy of their legacy, where their stories of service, innovation and humanity will continue to inspire.
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Birthday Parties
Mission: Best birthday ever
Zip up a flight suit, grab your dog tags, and dive into a fully hosted birthday “mission”. From air & sea adventures for preschoolers to rescue and cadet challenges for older children. Our Programmes team runs the activities, the children get awesome photo moments (and party bags), and you can add catering through our café.
Book a birthday party
Our Aircraft
Explore AircraftMore to explore
TALL TALES: Join us for a special series of book readings to celebrate New Zealand Children’s Book Week starting today at 2pm.
We’ve got a great selection of children’s books and we’d love to share them with your children during the week from 16 August to 21 August.
Each child will get a free sticker and poster, and we’ll have book specials so you can take them home!
Tamariki of all ages welcome – see you in front of our Tall Tails.
Timetable:
Sunday 16 August 2pm
Monday 17 August 10am
Tuesday 18 August 10am
Wednesday 19 August 10am
Thursday 20 August 10am
Friday 21 August 10am
#nzchildrensbookweek ... See MoreSee Less
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TALL TALES BOOK READINGS: Join us for a special series of book readings to celebrate New Zealand Children’s Book Week starting tomorrow.
We’ve got a great selection of children’s books and we’d love to share them with your children during the week from 16 August to 21 August.
Each child will get a free sticker and poster, and we’ll have book specials so you can take them home!
Tamariki of all ages welcome – see you in front of our Tall Tails.
Timetable:
Sunday 16 August 2pm
Monday 17 August 10am
Tuesday 18 August 10am
Wednesday 19 August 10am
Thursday 20 August 10am
Friday 21 August 10am
#nzchildrensbookweek ... See MoreSee Less
Comment on Facebook
Ahoy the USS Curtiss, an American battler of a ship with some interesting Kiwi connections.
The USS Curtiss was a seaplane tender which had been badly damaged with 19 sailors lost during the surprise Japanese attack on Pearl Harbour in Hawaii on 7 December 1941. By the end of 1941 she went in for repairs and was sent back into action in early 1942.
In 1942 the war in the Pacific was in full swing, and the RNZAF had joined the fight against the Japanese in the Northern Solomons and New Britain (now Papua New Guinea).
In October 1942 RNZAF Group Captain Sidney Wallingford was appointed to liaise with the American Command in the South Pacific and the Kiwi aircrews of No. 3 Squadron at Santo (now Vanuatu) and Guadalcanal and No. 9 Squadron at New Caledonia.
Group Captain Wallingford was running RNZAF liaison from headquarters aboard the 8600-ton Curtiss which was anchored in the Segond Channel at Santo.
Communications with the crews in the field was via telephone lines, but with the Curtiss bobbing in the tide, the lines were frequently lost between the ship and the airfields.
“The control of air operations from a ship was by no means easy owing to communication difficultes,’’ it was noted in the Official History of New Zealand in the Second World War.
So, in early 1943 Wallingford waved goodbye to the RNZAF’s home away from home aboard the Curtiss and moved to shore to a new home with No. 3 Squadron at Pallikulo Airfield on Santo.
Curtiss served out the rest of the war in the Pacific, seeing action in major battles including Tarawa, Saipan and Okinawa. She survived a kamikaze attack which killed 35 crew.
In the early 1950s the ship served in the Korean War, before being converted to a helicopter tender.
In the summer of 1956/1957 the Curtiss sailed to New Zealand before heading to Antarctica to deliver people and supplies for Operation Deep Freeze II.
The Curtiss spent time in both Lyttelton and Auckland during its time down here.
The ship was scrapped in 1972 after a long and distinguished career.
📸The USS Curtiss in the Pacific. Wikimedia Commons.
📸 RNZAF personnel on Santo. Image PR1863. ... See MoreSee Less
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RNZAF & RAAF started arriving home in numbers from England mid-42……..we could then start to make a difference with our American mates. And, we certainly did make a difference
Craig Mackie