VH-UTB   Ford 5-AT-C                           (c/n  5-AT-68)

                             

                                  This Ford had an interesting pedigree.  It was built as NC409H (ff 13 August 1929) as the Ford
                                  Company demonstrator for the "Club" model 5-AT in 1929.  It went to the UK in October 1930
                                  and was registered to the Ford Motor Company.   Seen at the foot of the page (image # 5) is a
                                  take-off of a cigarette card showing the Ford as such and published around 1936.  However, in
                                  January 1931 it underwent an unprecedented rego change (for those years) becoming G-ABHF
                                  (for Henry Ford).  In December of 1934 it was acquired by Guinea Airways.  Although fitted with
                                  14 seats when it arrived it was converted to a freighter and had a large freight hatch built  into the
                                  top of the fuselage aft of the mainplane, as seen in the # 3 shot below, wherein it appears to be
                                  emplaning a small aircraft (a Moth?).   The photo above is from the John Hopton collection, while
                                  that below (# 2) illustrates the aircraft in typical PNG surroundings..  This machine was later used
                                  to transport lumber in and around the Papua/ New Guinea area and suffered various and sundry
                                  mishaps over the years.  These culminated in a final crash at Little Wau Creek on 23 October 1941
                                  (it somehow evaded Japanese strafing attacks) whereby the aircraft lost the starboard engine on
                                  take-off (again with a full load of sawn lumber), swung into the dead engine and plunged into a
                                  deep gully resulting in its total write off.    Fortunately the pilot was not badly injured.   The Ford
                                  had made a trip to Brisbane in 1937 and illustration # 4 is a clipping from the Brisbane Courier
                                  Mail for 22 February of that year showing it at Archerfield. .
                   2.
                             
                     3.
                             
                      4.
                             
                    5.