23 Jun 2006

Air Nauru buys a new plane and intends using a more generic central Pacific name

1:00 pm on 23 June 2006

A revamped Air Nauru expects to resume full air services in the central Pacific in August after buying a replacement aircraft.

The airline has been struggling to provide a skeleton service for more than six months after its only jet was impounded by a creditor.

The Nauru Government says a new 737 300.. bought with the financial backing of Taiwan, will fly into Nauru next week on its way to Australia from the US.

It's to undergo registration formalities in Australia.

The CEO of Air Nauru, Geoffrey Bowmaker, says new routes and a name change for the airline are being planned.

"PLAY AUDIO:NAURU AIR"

IN:......Our intention is to look at something a little bit more generic to the area in which we fly, because we have never been, for a long time, just an operator to Nauru. We have always operated through Solomons, to Kiribati and the Marshall Islands, so we are wanting to develop an image and a new sort of platform I guess that reflects more generally the area in which we operate as opposed to just Nauru.

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