Nick Hopton

AN old wartime-era Douglas DC-3 airliner with a connection to Gawler was once used in a TV miniseries and is now resting in the garden of an aviation enthusiast in Western Australia.

After The Bunyip ran a story last month about the propellor- driven plane donated by Ansett founder Sir Reg Ansett being flown from Melbourne to Gawler aerodrome in January 1972,
reader Rob Boardman of Gawler South emailed the paper to say the aircraft was now on the property of flying school owner Blair Howe at Myalup, 140km south of Perth.

The plane was partially dismantled and driven from Gawler to a youth camp in the Chain of Ponds on Australia Day 1972 but was later moved to Parafield Airport then taken to WA.

But Mr Boardman shed light on the DC-3’s latest home after it earlier was used as an attraction at the McDonald’s in the Perth suburb of Midland.

Mr Boardman said he and his wife Julie visited Mr Howe’s Myalup property a few years ago to look over the DC-3.

“It still has its original Wright Cyclone 9 cylinder R1820 engines,” he said. “Ansett’s first DC-3s had that particular engine so Ansett specified that engine for all his DC-3s, even though they had changed to the slightly more powerful Pratt and Whitney R1830 14-cylinder Twin Wasp radials.”

Mr Howe told The Bunyip he bought the aircraft for $10,000 about 15 years ago after it had first been a fixture nicknamed “the flying hamburger” at the fast-food restaurant, which spent $140,000 repurposing it.

“When McDonald’s took the franchise over from the private franchise holder that had it in Midland, they didn’t want the aeroplane because already someone had fallen down the stairs, and you know the rules,” he said.

Mr Howe said the plane went to a museum group “and it sat there for quite a while”.

“Then the ABC got hold of it, put it back together and painted it and used it in a series called The Shark Net (aired in 2003), which was about a serial killer we had – the last one they hanged here,” he said.

After that, the aircraft was auctioned 0ff and “it’s now in my garden here”.

“It got fairly badly knocked around when it was there (at the Chain of Ponds youth camp, Fainfield) and ... it went to Parafield and they spent $150,000 fixing it up and got it to WA,” Mr Howe said.

He said lots or people stopped at his property to look at the old airliner. He is quoted in a newspaper article as calling the plane “his eight-tonne garden gnome”.