Netherlands Indies 1931 Air Mail Special Flight to Australia
From Stamps of the World
- Issue Date : April 1, 1931
- Designed by : M.P.Pattist and De Kruyff van Dorssen
- Printed by : Joh.Enschedé, Haarlem (the Netherlands)
- Print Process : Photogravure
- Watermark: none
- Perforations : 12.50
- Valid for postage until May 16, 1931
This emission was only valid for mail with special flight Netherlands Indies to Australia on May 12, 1931. This flight with airplane "Abel Tasman" was made with kapt.Pattist. Total amount of sold stamps: 35.768
 Cover of Special Flight. To give a through service from Amsterdam to Australia, KLM added an experimental flight from Batavia to Melbourne. The through flight left Amsterdam on 30 April and arrived in Batavia on 9 May. The Batavia to Melbourne leg was 11 - 19 May. A special 1 Guilden stamp was issued in both the Netherlands and the Dutch East Indies to pay the airmail postage for this flight. It is shown on the cover cancelled with the special Batavia cachet dated 9 May. The cover was backstamped at Sydney on 18 May. The KLM flight entered Australia at Wyndham rather than at Darwin. The plane was a Fokker FVII trimotor (like the Southern Cross) named Abel Tasman and that name is shown in the cachet. The pilot and co-pilot were J. Pattist and P. Moll. Source: Airmails of New Zealand, volume 2 (1986) compiled by Douglas A Walker, and The New Zealand Airmail Catalogue, (2nd Edition, 1994) by James Stapleton. Both are published by the Air Mail Society of New Zealand. |
