Aviation Memorabilia Newsletter

For Air Canada Retirees
(Part of the ACFamily Network)

June 12, 2012 - Issue 1208

Reader Submitted Photos -  The photos and information below have been submitted to us by our faithful readers.  

Ken Pickford has done an investigation regarding the article on the hijack we had in NetLetter nr 1205:

In the item on the December 1971 DC-9 hijacking, you say the flight was en route from Thunder Bay to YVR and that the date was December 24, 1971. All related news items say it was December 26, 1971 (Boxing Day) and en route to YYZ, not YVR (don't think there has ever been any direct air service YQT-YVR).
By the way, the hijacker was arrested in 2001, 30 years after the hijacking, working as a teacher in the York City suburb of Mount Vernon. He pleaded guilty to the hijacking and was extradited to Canada and sentenced to 5 years in prison, but only served one year before being released and deported back to the U.S. Links to a few of the many related news items below. The first item was written after the death of the flight's Captain in 2008. It refers to the flight as flight 932 from YQT to YYZ.
 

http://www.citytv.com/toronto/

http://www.cbc.ca/news/

http://www.nytimes.com

In a strange coincidence, he was charged with the hijacking on September 10, 2011, one day before the 9/11 terrorist hijackings and related attacks (note the September 11, 2001 date of the NY Times news item above.) He'd been arrested a couple of days earlier. He was also wanted for a couple of U.S. offenses dating back many years but the statute of limitations on those had expired. After his brief prison sentence in Cuba following the hijacking, he'd moved to Africa (Tanzania) and lived there for about 20 years before returning to the U.S. in the early 1990s. It's interesting that he was linked to the hijacking from his fingerprints on a can of ginger ale on the AC flight.

In another article from the same NetLetter, Ken tells us that in the photo caption re CP's start of DC-10 service to Australia, one of the CP staff in SYD is referred to as Margaret Hili. Not 100% certain but I think her last name was Hill. You may want to double-check to see if Hili is a typo.(We rechecked the magazine and the correct name is Margaret Hill - sorry Margaret - eds)

And yet another gremlin problem - In the item on the start of North Star service to London in 1947, the date printed on the photo of CF-TEM reads 1957

Paul Gauthier, referring to NetLetter nr 1206, sends us this message: Again, I want to thank you for a very interesting newsletter and for publishing my comments in regards to the Nordair video.

I just have a question: in the AC News, you state that AC has been identified as the customer for 3 B-777-300ER's with 5 on order and that AC operates a fleet of 10; according to the AC website, it operates 12 -300ER's and 6 -200LR's; does this mean that AC has ordered additional B-777-300ER's? I haven't read anything about this; or am I misreading?
And again, keep up the great work!
Paul Gauthier Service Director -retired- YYZ

(The information we had was from the Speednews" website, but we have no way of confirming the details. From what is on the internet, we believe that five options for new B777-300ER's are now firm orders for delivery in 2013 and 2014 and that Air Canada is also in negotiation with Air India to lease 5 more B777-200LRs from them - eds)

Sometimes we receive articles and information that just doesn't fit in our other areas. This is where it goes!

Loraine Gore thought this story would be of interest to some of our readers:

Some days, retirement from this business really is a gift from God!
It is by Laurie Driggs, an AA pilot, who was in Dallas Wednesday, April 4th, 2012.

I was number two on L taxiway for 17R, on my way to TUL when it came through. When we left the gate the radar showed a small cell coming toward the airport, nothing bigger than a typical spring storm. There was a much larger storm to the northwest but not a factor. In the time it took to taxi from the west side to the 17R pad, the little storm became intense. Light rain, some wind gusts, then heavier rain, some wind-shear reported and then departures halted. Shut down and let the passengers use phones, being told it would be about 20 minutes and we were completely surrounded by other jets. A couple of minutes pass and all hell broke loose.

Heavy rain, gusty winds, the tower reported a microburst on the south airport boundary with 75 knot winds. Next the passengers on all the planes were telling the crews about the tornadoes (you know, because they can have internet and we can't, as that wouldn't be safe). One plane checks in and the controller says he's on the wrong frequency. He explains that the other tower was being evacuated and he told him to try this one. Tower then admits they are down to only a skeleton crew.  Tower states they have a tornado on radar but don't see anything, asks if any plane is facing south enough to see. No one can. I call dispatch on the phone since no one is answering any radio frequency (ops, dispatch etc). I get a dispatcher who says he is the only one there, nearly everyone else is in the basement. He is a NWS weather observer and just took a look, he said not good, a tornado went across the south end of the field and another is on its way, only a little further away, hail is on the way and he was leaving for the basement. Then the hail began, little peas, then nickels and dimes until a sustained blast of golf balls with more than one tennis ball. And then it was over.  

 
Ops called all the jets back to the terminal for maintenance inspections.  We were told 63 airplanes were exposed to the hail. There was the ability to inspect only one MD-80 at a time since they didn't have operators for the lift trucks (deicers). The 757 I was in suffered significant visible damage to every horizontal surface with actual punctures to the upper skin of the flaps and ailerons. Off the gate to back on was only 1 hour 44 mins. The terminal was pandemonium. All flights for the next few hours cancelled. The news was reporting all flights for the rest of the day were cancelled. The airport ops told me that the instrument approaches (localizers?) on the south side of the airport were all knocked out, so only one runway had an approach available. The agents did a great job. The hotel desk was probably the hardest hit, it took many crews hours to get rooms (you couldn't buy your own if you wanted to, none to be found). Tomorrow is going to be a tough day in DFW. I would guess many planes out of service, lots of revenue stand-bys and lots of dead heads. Good thing we have a lot of spare jets in the desert! 

Referring to the item in NetLetter nr 1207 regarding United Airlines, Jannet Tricarico points
out that United have changed their minds:

UA now able to continue extending Partner travel to Air Canada. Good news! We have been notified that United Airlines will in fact be able to continue to offer the Partner Travel for ZED (Zonal Employee Discount). This means that the ZED agreement will continue permitting Air Canada employees to be accompanied by travel partners on UA and vice-versa. Employees, spouses and children will still be able to travel on UA; as will unaccompanied parents.  

Regards Jannet

KLM is offering passengers a chance to "like" their seatmate. The system is being tested that allows passengers to use Facebook or LinkedIn profiles to pick the people they would like to sit next to on their flight. Officially known as "Meet & Seat" When one calls up their flight's seating plan, it indicates which passengers have registered their profiles. (This system is not applicable to the front end crew members - eds)
 
Farnborough International Airshow 2012 in July 9-15, 2012, Farnborough, Hampshire, UK
 
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Way back in the dim and distant past, in Parliament, a statement had been made, through erroneous reporting, that had cast aspersions about the youthfulness of the T.C.A. pilots. 

This mistake was rectified, meanwhile Dave Mathias came up with this cartoon published in "Between Ourselves" issued May 1944.    

Ever wondered where that freight consignment of yours went to? This advert was found in a local newspaper.