Air New Zealand draws a Kiwi bird in the sky

Earlier today I got an alert on my phone from Flightradar24 saying that an Air New Zealand 787 was  performing a special flight, so curiously I watched it to see where it was going and what was so special about it. I checked in on it again an hour later and I noticed it started to make some sort of drawing. Roughly 2 hours 40 minutes later it had drawn a Kiwi in the sky, as that’s the national bird of New Zealand.

IMAGE TAKE FROM FLIGHTRADAR24

The 787,with the flight number NZ4376, operating the flight was ZK-NZE and was sporting the "all Blacks" livery. The flight took off and landed in Christchurch.

AIR NEW ZEALAND B787-9 ZK-NZE (MSN 34334)

After some investigating I discovered this flight was operated for Koru Care, which is a charity that Air New Zealand is involved with. This is an organization that creates special experiences for “Kiwi kids who need them the most,” who have disabilities and illnesses.

The organization plans all kinds of special travel for kids — in some cases Koru Care offers free trips to either Australia or the United States for these children, and on top of that they organize an annual Koru Care flight, which is what this was. There were a total of 50 kids on this flight, along with the special people in their lives, and it was intended to be the flight of a lifetime.

Over the years we’ve seen planes draw all kinds of things in the sky. For example, Qantas drew a Kangaroo in the sky for its last 747 flight, EL AL drew a 747 in the sky for its last 747 flight, Virgin Atlantic drew a heart in the sky for Valentine’s Day and Russian pilots drew a phallic image in the sky in solidarity.