Air Tractor Ferries From Texas To Australia

Neville Dunn of Dunn Aviation, an Australian Air Tractor operator, recently took delivery of AT-802A-0900, the 900th in the 802 ag and firefighting series built by Air Tractor in Olney, Texas.

The AT-802A-0900 ferry pilot left the Air Tractor headquarters on June 9th, reaching Australia in mid-June.

Also on order is the AT-802A-0905. The airplanes are configured as single-engine air tankers for aerial firefighting.

Dunn offers a wide range of services in addition to firefighting including pest and disease control, baiting, fertilizing, seeding, oil slick pollution control, mine site dust suppression, and revegetation. Dunn’s father, Ian Dunn, founded the company in Ballidu in 1965. 

“My father had a colorful history,” Neville Dunn recalls. “He had never got his pilot’s license until 1961. From 1947 when he began barnstorming to 1961, no license. And to top it off, they said, to prepare the new license, you had to send them two photos. One photo is to be on file. And one photo is on the license. Dad only had two photos of himself. So, one was him standing there. And another one was him with his arm around a Jersey cow, for which he’d won the blue ribbon. Which one did they put on his license? Well, of course, the one with his arm around the jersey cow.”

Neville Dunn comes from a family of pilots. “Dad had five children with our mother: four boys and a girl. We all either fly or operate aircraft,” Dunn said.

“So, an aircraft to our family was like a family car.”

Dunn bought his first Air Tractor in 1997, an AT-502B, and has been a believer in Air Tractor planes since. “It’s just the reliability of the Air Tractor and the service network behind it,” Dunn said. Currently, Dunn Aviation employs 15 pilots for their wide range of services.

FMI: www.airtractor.com