Kimberley FIFO Charter Flights

The Kimberley combines the two things that make workforce aviation difficult: distance and thin infrastructure. Sectors from Perth are long, the region is vast, and destinations range from sealed regional airports at Broome and Kununurra down to short unsealed strips with no services at all. Aircraft selection here genuinely determines whether a rotation is possible, not merely whether it is economic.

The wet season then changes the rules for several months. Unsealed strips can become unusable at short notice, road access to and from aerodromes is frequently cut, and a plan that works comfortably in the dry can fail repeatedly between roughly November and April. Programs that survive the wet are the ones designed with alternates and contingency built in from the start.

The work itself is also more varied than pure mining. Resources and energy sit alongside agriculture and pastoral operations, infrastructure and construction projects, remote community programs and tourism-linked seasonal work, each with different crew sizes and different tolerance for schedule variation.

Broome and Kununurra are the practical regional gateways, with Derby, Halls Creek and Fitzroy Crossing serving specific corridors. Perth and Darwin are both realistic origins depending on where a workforce is drawn from, and Darwin is frequently the shorter and more reliable option for the eastern Kimberley.

Because sectors are long, range and payload interact. A fully loaded aircraft on a long remote sector with limited fuel uplift at the destination may need a payload reduction or a fuel stop, which is exactly the kind of constraint that should be identified when the program is designed rather than on the morning of a flight.

• Origins, Perth (PER) and Darwin (DRW), sometimes Broome for intra-region work
• Gateways, Broome (BME), Kununurra (KNX), Derby (DRB)
• Remote strips, many short, unsealed and without services or fuel
• Alternates, planned in advance for both weather and strip serviceability

Between November and April, the useful question is not whether disruption will happen but how the program absorbs it. In practice that means favouring sealed destinations where possible, nominating alternates, allowing realistic buffers around shift changeovers, and having an agreed escalation route so a stranded crew is a phone call rather than a crisis.

It also means being honest about what cannot be promised. A charter into an unsealed strip during the wet may be cancelled on the day for good reason. Programs that plan for that, with a fallback into a sealed gateway plus ground transfer, or a shifted rotation day, lose far less time than those that treat every flight as certain.

Aviall Group is not an aircraft operator. We source across a wide operator base, including operators with genuine remote-strip experience and approvals in northern Australia, and shortlist on suitability for the specific aerodrome and season.

Crew sizes in the Kimberley are typically smaller than in the Pilbara, so turboprops dominate. Larger mobilisations for construction or project phases bring regional jets into play where a sealed airport is available.

• Small turboprops (up to 19 seats), remote strips, pastoral and community work
• Mid-size turboprops (30–70 seats), the standard for regional rosters
• Regional jets (70–100 seats), larger project mobilisations into sealed airports
• Combination movements, a trunk sector plus a light aircraft leg to site

We arrange dedicated aircraft charter capacity. We are not the aircraft operator, the construction contractor or the travel management company. Every movement is flown by an appropriately approved operator chosen for the route, the aerodrome and the season.

Enquiries here come from resources and energy operators, infrastructure contractors, government and community programs, pastoral businesses and travel managers coordinating on their behalf. We work to whichever interface already exists.