Air New Zealand's Black Magic arrives

Air New Zealand’s newest Boeing 777-300ER, ZK-OKQ, arrived in Auckland on 12 January after a 14 hour flight direct from Paine Field in Seattle.

Air New Zealand Chief Pilot Captain David Morgan was at the controls; and on board was the airline's CEO Rob Fyfe and a small group of Air NZ technical staff.

Painting of the aircraft is part of Air New Zealand’s sponsorship of the New Zealand Rugby Football Union and the World Champion All Blacks rugby team; and this aircraft craft will become the world’s largest commercially operated aircraft painted all black.

The B777-300ER, Air New Zealand’s fifth and final currently on order, is expected to go into service on 23 January with a flight from Auckland to Brisbane return.

The aircraft’s all- black paint job is overlaid with a design featuring New Zealand’s distinctive silver fern that extends across the rear of the aircraft up to its tail.

The paint job was extremely complex requiring 14 expert painters at Boeing working in shifts 24 hours a day to get the job done.