Are planes flying at night in Papua New Guinea?

Question

I was watching the old TV show Destination Truth and the host Josh Gates said that no planes fly after dark in Papua New Guinea, is what he was saying fact?

Answer 1

The Civial Aviation Safety Authority (CASA) of Papua New Guinea allows flying at night, assuming the aircraft is equipped for night flying:

91.511 Night instruments and equipment

(a) Each powered aircraft with an airworthiness certificate operated by night shall be equipped in accordance with 91.509 and have—

1. except as provided in paragraph (b), a means of indicating rate of turn and slip; and
2. position lights; and
3. an anti-collision light system; and
4. illumination for each required instrument or indicator or charts.

(b) An aircraft equipped with a third attitude instrument indicator that is usable through 360° of pitch and roll does not need to be equipped with a means of indicating rate of turn.

^{(CASA PNG Part 91 General Operating and Flight Rules)}

However, as @Pondlife pointed out in the comments, flying VFR at night is only allowed in the vicinity of the airport:

91.301 VFR meteorological minima

(a) Except as provided in rule 91.303 and paragraphs (b) and (c), a pilot-in-command must not operate an aircraft under VFR— [...]

3. more than 5 nm from the aerodrome of departure at night.

Any flights further away will require flying under IFR at night.

Searching through the playback feature of flightradar24, I found a night flight from Moro to Port Moresby performed in a King Air just a few hours ago:

^{(flightradar24.com)}

Sunset in Port Moresby was at 18:33 local time today and the aircraft departed at 19:16 and was estimated to land at 20:39.