More than 160 plus people were at Joyes Hall, Charles Sturt University, Wagga Wagga on Saturday 16 November for the second annual Australian Aviation Hall of Fame (AAHOF) Induction Gala Dinner.
Nine Australians and Qantas Airways Limited were inducted during an evening celebrating the significant contributions the inductees made to civil aviation, not only in Australia but around the world.
The event was attended by the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Infrastructure and Regional Development, The Hon Warren Truss MP, and a virtual ‘who’s who’ of Australia’s aviation industry.
Mr Truss presented the highly coveted Southern Cross Award (awarded to an organisation which has made an outstanding contribution to aviation) to Qantas Airways Limited.
Inductees included the three men who were instrumental in founding the fledgling air service operator Queensland and Northern Territory Aerial Services Limited (QANTAS) in June 1920 – Hudson Fysh, Paul McGinnes and Fergus McMaster.
Joining them was Arthur Baird, Qantas’s first engineer, who not only assembled and maintained the initial aircraft fleet, but also taught many pilots to fly them.
Other inductees included Lawrence Wackett, regarded by many as the father of the Australian aircraft industry; Hubert Wilkins the Australian polar explorer, ornithologist, pilot, soldier, geographer and photographer who brought aviation to the Antarctic; the inventor of the aircraft 'black box' Dr David Warren; highly regarded aviatrix Freda Thompson, the first Australian woman to fly solo from England to Australia; and aviator and entrepreneur Dick Smith.