Registered 22 July 1930. Cancelled on transfer to Belgian military aviation 18 November 1938.

PK-AFC arrives in Australia on an experimental air mail service from the Netherlands. PK-AFC flew the legs after Batavia. The success of the flight prompted Imperial Airways to start a joint UK-Australia service with Qantas although it took over three years to get going . Under pressure from the UK, KNILM was barred from operating regular services into Australia until 1938. The Dutch were unable to retaliate by barring the Imperial/Qantas from the Dutch East Indies because KLM needed to transit India and other British possessions. Photo from: State Library of Western Australia

Built in 1925 for Australian arctic explorer George Hubert Wilkins as NC1985. Bought by Charles Kingsford Smith and Charles Ulm sans engines and instruments on 31 Oct 1927 for the first crossing of the Pacific by air in 1928 - still registered as NC1985. Re-registered G-AUSU on 04 Jul 1928. Re-registered VH-USU in January 1929 but lapsed 3 Jul 1929. Renewed on 16 Apr 1931. Used on various other record-breaking flights or more mundane duties, it was eventually sold to the Australian Government in July 1935. In 1958, it was put on display at the original Brisbane's Eagle Farm airport before being moved to the present site circa 1989.

The Southern Cross was made famous by Charles Kingsford Smith and his team. It later became VH-USU, but it is shown here preserved in Brisbane in this hangar with its original registration NC1985.

This was not the first time the Southern Cross had flown to New Zealand. The first time was 1928. Charles Kingsford Smith flew back there in 1933 to raise money by providing joy flights. He and the plane returned in 1934. While at Palmerston North in 1933 Southern Cross ran intro a ditch putting it out of the air for a month.

Photo believed to be at Vancouver, possibly at Landsdowne airport which was a temporary airport for the city prior to the opening of the Sea Island airport (Vancouver International). G-CASC was destroyed in a hangar fire at Winnipeg on March 4, 1931. Photo from: City of Vancouver Archives

The photo is thought to show PH-AGR carrying out KLM's very first scheduled fortnightly service on the Amsterdam - Batavia (Jakarta) route - the pilot does look like Evert van Dijk. The aircraft called at Palembang on 3 October 1930 on the way out and returned on 17 October. Certainly it is not yet named Reiger (heron) here. The press reported KLM giving its aircraft names on 26 August 1931. Photo from: Leiden University Libraries

'Here comes the rain again.' Engine change in Saigon for one of the 15 Fokker F.VIIb-3ms orginally acquired by Air Orient. F-AMBU is believed to have ended up in the Spanish Civil War. Maurice Noguès was Air France's chief pilot, killed in the crash of the Dewoitine D.332 F-AMMY in January 1934.

First aircraft for KNILM - Royal Netherlands East Indies Airways. As can be seen here the name was initially NILM, but the royal status was bestowed already on 24 September 1928, one day before H-NAFA completed its delivery flight to Batavia. To PK-AFA in 1929. Sold to NEI army air force in 1936. Photo from: Leiden University Libraries

One of 15 F.VIIb/3ms leased and later bought by Air Orient, a French airline flying to the Middle East and Far East. It was one of the companies that formed Air France in 1933, and its hippocampus logo lives on as the Air France logo. PH-AFT became F-ALZR in May 1932. Photo from: Leiden University Libraries

A little mishap on the Prague - Zürich - Geneva - Marseille route. ČLS was Czechoslovakia's international airline while ČSA then focussed on domestic services. Photo from: ETH-Bibliothek Zürich

Registered to KLM in late February 1929 and damaged in a storm near Haamstede on July 15, 1936. The registration was cancelled on August 7, 1936 and the aircraft was scrapped. Parts were said to be sold to Air France.

On the night of 19 March 1932, the day of the opening of the famous Sydney Harbour bridge, the Southern Cross took a load of passengers to view the illuminations on the bridge. Returning to Mascot - as it then was - the Southern Cross made a heavy landing and was badly damaged. The aircraft underwent extensive repairs before returning to the air.

The famous Southern Cross taking off from what was then Mascot Aerodrome.

Inauguration of terminal building at Deurne in 1931. Photo from: FelixArchief

The Plage i Laśkiewicz company, manufacturer of the Lublin aircraft, built eleven F.VIIb/3ms for the Polish national airline. This was the last one, replacing the first SP-ABC (c/n 3) which was sold to Sabena. Photo by: Walter Hahn / SLUB / Deutsche Fotothek

The Fokker F.VII Friendship flew from Trepassey, Newfoundland, to Southampton via Burry Point, Wales with Wilmer Stultz, Louis Gordon and Amelia Earhart as a passenger. The aircraft's owner, Amy Phipps Guest, had wanted to become the first woman to cross the Atlantic by air herself, but when her family objected, Amelia was selected to go in her place. Photo from: Purdue University Libraries

Inauguration of the first air services within the Netherlands East Indies, to Bandoeng (Bandung) and to Semarang from Batavia - Tjililitan (Cililitan), now Jakarta - Halim. The KNILM company was not a KLM subsidiary. The other F.VIIb/3m is H-NAFA (c/n 5069). Photo from: Wereldmuseum

PK-AFB was part of the KNILM fleet until it crashed on February 4, 1938. Sistership PK-AFC visited Australia during the many years Dutch authorities sought approval to add Australia to the KLM/KNILM route map. When approval was finally received, KNILM was using Lockheed 14s and there is no record of -AFB ever visiting Australia. The photo is believed to be at one of the Dutch East Indies (Indonesian) ports used by Qantas on its Australia-Singapore service. Photo from: Hudson Fysh Collection/State Library of New South Wales