Tom Ballantyne, Chief Correspondent of the Hong Kong-published Orient Aviation magazine, has more than 35 years experience in international journalism. Born in Edinburgh, Scotland in 1947 he began his career in the 1960s with the Scottish Daily Mail newspaper in Edinburgh, working for a number of other Scottish publications before moving overseas in 1969 to report on events in Australia and later Southern Africa.

During the early 1970s, Tom was a war correspondent for South Africa’s Argus newspaper group, covering conflicts in the then Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe), as well as the Portuguese territories of Angola and Mozambique. He returned to Australia in 1975 to begin an 18-year stint with one of that country’s premier newspapers, the Sydney Morning Herald, covering a wide range of issues from industrial relations and crime to politics and defence. After spending three years as the Herald’s Chief of Staff, Tom was appointed Travel and Aviation Editor in 1989. During this period he authored Breakfast in Bali, Supper at the Savoy, a humorous travel tale, as well as co-authoring a second book, A Year of Good Weekends.

Building a growing reputation as a specialist writer on the international aviation and airline industry, he left the Herald in 1994, working as Asia Correspondent for the London-based Airline Business magazine before being appointed Chief Correspondent of Orient Aviation. As well as writing, he is a regular commentator on aviation issues on television and radio in Australia, Asia and the United Kingdom.  Tom is also a speaker at numerous aviation conferences and seminars and is a media consultant to the International Air Transport Association’s (IATA) Air Transport Safety Information Project, a global program designed to help non-aviation journalists better understand the sensitive issues surrounding airline safety.

Still based in Sydney, Australia, he won the prestigious GE Aircraft Engines Award for the Best Air Transport Submission at the Royal Aerospace Society’s Journalist of the Year Awards in London in 1998. In 2000 he was a double winner in the Australian National Aviation Press Club annual awards, named the country’s Aviation Writer of the Year as well as author of the Best Aviation Feature Story of the Year. He won the latter award again in 2004 for a series of articles on Asia’s budget airline boom.

Travelling extensively around the world to report on all aspects of the airline industry, In between flights, Tom recovers from jet leg by sailing the extensive waterways north of Sydney with his wife aboard their yacht Scotch Mist.