Mike Skudder - Life with the high-flyers

He’s helped guide thousands of aircraft safely in and out of Queenstown, even the US President’s Air Force One, and faced the heat helping fight hundreds of local fires, clocking an impressive track record of protecting and saving lives over 40 years.

Mike Skudder’s lived a life of devotion to the community, and although now retired after 45 years as an air traffic flight service officer, he’s still a Frankton Fire Brigade volunteer, traps predators and works as a high-end tour guide. Mike’s also served faithfully on the Queenstown RSA.

Born in Timaru in 1955, Mike grew up on a farm, answering a newspaper ad for trainee air traffic flight service staff after finishing Timaru College. One of 250 applicants for 12 trainee positions, Mike was flown from Timaru to Christchurch for his initial interview on what was then national airline NAC’s DC3 service.

“I started training at Wigram RNZAF Base the day after turning 18,” he recalls. “We had NCOs yelling, ‘Do this! Do that!’ They even cut our hair off and charged us 50 cents to do it!”

Mike then worked for Civil Aviation at Christchurch Airport from 1973 for eight years. “It was a very interesting job, including talking to the American Air Force flying to and from Antarctica a lot. Every 5 degrees they’d call us with a position report,” Mike says. “On each flight they had to make a PNR (Point of No Return) decision, after assessing fuel, any technical issues and weather. They fly over thousands of miles of ocean with nothing in between.”

Mike had to learn US slang, one American pilot drawling, ’Can you tell my base that we’re having trouble with the honey pot (toilet)?’

Queenstown Aerodrome only operated in daylight so a shift-weary Mike, who’d enjoyed childhood Queenstown holidays, snapped up a transfer here in 1981. Even then staff housing was an issue, but he scored an airport staff house in Humphrey Street on a large section with magnificent views, paying just $16.10 a week. After his initial Queenstown training in 1976 he relieved at Timaru, Oamaru, Dunedin, Invercargill, Milford Sound, Hokitika and Westport towers. Mike’s also done relieving stints at Niue and Rarotonga in the South Pacific, and Paraparaumu in the North Island.

Once in Queenstown, Mike took his eye off the ball playing squash, where he met wife of 40 years Helen on the court.

The mid to late 80s were heady days, Queenstown tower staff trying to keep up with the big influx of private jets landing while working solo shifts. That was until the 1987 sharemarket crash hit.

“You had to think on your feet as you were by yourself. We were at the coalface. You just got on with it and dealt with things.”

Managing the Milford tower at its busy peak times could be stressful. “You’d go to the bathroom, needed or not, and get an early lunch late morning, then sit back and wait to be bombarded with continuous aircraft movements during the afternoon.”

The infrastructure and large entourage that arrived with US President Bill Clinton in 1999 was “eye watering”. “I walked around the corner to our truck to do an aerodrome inspection early one morning and heard, ’Halt! Who goes there?!’ I turned to see a 6ft 6in, 300-pound American serviceman guarding Clinton’s limo in our rescue fire garage.” Soon after the friendly minder was offering to take photos of Mike posing in the President’s limo. “He gave me some Presidential M&Ms (sweets) and a few other mementos, like Air Force One’s Presidential cinema library and its musical entertainment brochures,” he says.

Sandbags were placed around the President’s jet as a barrier. “If we approached it or stepped over the barrier we could be shot.” There was even a direct phone line installed in the tower that supposedly connected straight to the White House. “We were all too scared to try it. There were snipers everywhere.”

Upon transferring to Queenstown, Mike had been offered one of two Fire Brigade uniforms, his two airport tower predecessors both local volunteers. His Humphrey Street house meant he was often first responder at Frankton when the siren went off.

Mike received his Two-Year Gold Bar for 43 years’ service recently, callouts increasing dramatically from just five in 1983 to 271 last year. Brigade secretary-treasurer from 1987 until 2005, still assistant until recently, Mike’s now Brigade Support and was the driving force behind a 50th anniversary brigade history book compiled in 2023.

Mike’s served on the Queenstown RSA for 12 years from 2005, mostly as secretary-treasurer and Poppy Day coordinator.

Now retired, he’s still in the fire brigade, and in demand escorting cruise passengers between Port Chalmers and Milford Sound, showing off Queenstown en route. He also controls predator traps on the Peninsula and keeps fit at the gym three mornings a week. “There’s always something to do after breakfast,” he grins.