Click Here to watch a YouTube video about Captain Nicole Alicea, the first black female pilot to fly for Southwest Airlines.

Nicole commented "Always believe in yourself, don't let anyone say that you can't do it, because you can!"

Robert Arnold has sent us this discovery -

I was at a flea market on the weekend and came across a very interesting hot jug. These were used in the galleys on TCA Viscounts.

What makes this one so interesting? It’s painted all black and on the lid, in yellow painted text are the words, “If Found In Flight, Return to V/O, No.1 Hgr. YWG".

On the front, facing the plug-in prongs, in white painted text, are the words “Test Only”. The guy who sold it to me didn’t have a clue what it was, or what it was used for, but I did know and, due to his lack of knowledge, he ended up selling it to me for 3 bucks. Not bad for a piece of airline history. I told him my wife would repurpose it as a flower vase. Long story short, no wife, no flowers.

I wonder if any of your readers remember this item. It's made by Stiebel Eltron in Western Germany. Type HCL-1, No. H01S2, Watts, 560, Volts 28.

Robert Arnold

Neil Burton shares this information -

Photo image (circa 1936) was courtesy of Harry and Mrs. Mayson. 

This photo was possibly taken in October 1936, when “Ginger” Coote was performing one of his many mercy flights in B.C. This particular flight was from the Vidette mine area, up Deadmans Creek and northwest of Kamloops Lake. Once they had an injured person on board, Coote was able to land at Kamloops within twenty minutes. His flying base at the time was on Gunn Lake, in the Bralorne area of B.C.

CF–AUX, a Fairchild 51A, built in 1934, by Canadian Fairchild, was originally registered as G–CAIH, before its certificate of registration was cancelled that same year, and was rebuilt with a new fuselage (51A). This aircraft was registered to Bridge River and Cariboo Airways Ltd., of Bridge River, B.C. on March 28, 1934.

Russell Leslie “Ginger” Coote and his father Andrew Leslie Coote (retired) were sole directors of the company, having bought out the other directors by mid-June 1935. Bridge River and Cariboo Airways Ltd.’s name was changed to Ginger Coote Airways Ltd. on April 16, 1938 and that name accepted by the B.C. registrar of companies on May 26, 1938. On April 20, 1938, George William Grant McConachie was appointed a director of Bridge River and Cariboo Airways Ltd.

CF–AUX, piloted by 24-year-old Len Waagen and 3 passengers, a housewife and 2 men, perished in the crash of the aircraft on a flight from Vancouver to Zeballos, on the west coast of Vancouver Island, on May 27, 1938. The wreckage was not discovered until March 9, 1939, when come upon by two timber cruisers of Bloedel, Stewart and Welch. The site was about 15 miles west of Port Alberni, B.C., near Franklin River, down the Alberni Canal.

It appears the aircraft registration was never changed to Ginger Coote Airways Ltd. “Ginger” Coote’s shares of the Bridge River and Cariboo Airways Ltd. were transferred to McConachie Air Transport Limited and G.W.G. McConachie near the end of April 1938.

Here is a photo of a poster for Ginger Coote Airways Ltd, which hung in the Bralorne-Pioneer Museum, on a visit to the museum in the summer of 2007.

(Sources: Royal B.C. Museum Archives; Vancouver Sun; Kamloops Sentinel; Canadian Aircraft Register 1929 – 1945 compiled by John R. Ellis.)

Research: Neil Burton

Air Canada NAVI was published February 22, 2017 and launched March 2017 and placed in the aircraft cabin, with the title "Welcome aboard".

The new magazine, a new monthly title from Air Canada, has been launched to give a closer look at the organization. At left is a photo of the March cover page.

This is a photo of the employees in the publication. 

Front row from the left: Nathalie Guite, Paul Lebel, Marianne Foulds, Lynn Gobeil, Ines Brosig, Melanie Vincelli, Marie-Claire Desrochers, Sabina Haddad and Nairy Chamelian.

Middle row from the left: Michel St-Pierre, Jean Phillippe Forget, Anthony Delatolla, Helen Kotsovos, Saifuddin Husna, Lise Albert and Nadia Lefebvre.

Back row from the left: Matthew Lee, Jean Francois Bisson-Ross, Patti White, Daniel Belanger, Leslie-Anne Vezina, Charles Cormier and Tim Fisher.

Issue dated June 1982.

June-1, 1982 - Passenger operations at New York's JFK international airport were moved from the British Airways complex to the United Airlines terminal.

The fifth National Pionairs Annual General Meeting was held at the Anaheim Marriott in May for 550 attendees.

The newly elected Pionairs' executive shown here from the left: Hudson Connolly, Bill Spratt, Ozzie Candy, Dorothy Grant, George Fox and Joe Lorimer. 

Scheduled air service to Sydney, Nova Scotia began May 1, 1942 when a TCA 10-passenger Lockheed 10A landed at the city's airport enroute from Moncton to Gander and St. John's.

The aircraft was under the control of Captains Burton J. Treris and Walt Fowler. The stewardess was Dorothy Reid, R.N. a native of North Sydney.

Issue dated July 1982.

On July 3, 1962, in Montreal, TCA/Air Canada moved its headquarters from the Aviation Building across the street to the newly opened Place Ville Marie aka PVM. It not only became Montreal's tallest structure at the time, but also heralded, with its underground complex, an entirely new era of modern urban living, to be copied throughout the world. 

Historically, in 1937, TCA was created by an Act of Parliament and the seaplane "Caledonia" from Imperial Airways arrived from Southampton and landed at Boucherville near Montreal, heralding a new era in trans-Atlantic travelling to be followed by these milestones:

• 1941 - the official opening of a new international airport at Dorval, near Montreal.
• 1943 - TCA begins flying to the United Kingdom.
• 1945 - TCA buys its first DC-3.
• 1947 - TCA begins service to Ireland.
• 1952 - TCA service to Germany begins.
• 1958 - service by TCA to Antigua, Switzerland and Belgium.

Wings of Life

In 1981, two members of the Montreal Flying Club suggested circling the globe in a light plane to raise money for cancer research. Before long a group of enthusiasts supported the idea.

Romi Singn, a DC-8 First Officer for Air Canada was coordinator of the project which was an attempt for a world record. A flight operations committee was formed under the leadership of Timothy Smith, Senior Photo Lithographer who charted the flight course to coincide with well-travelled shipping routes and to avoid bad weather, political instability and hijackers.

On August 1, 1982, Don Muir of Sioux Lookout, Ont, son of Fraser Muir, Economic Analyst, Marketing, Montreal of Air Canada and Andre Daemen took off from Mirabel Airport in a Cessna 210.

The route was from Montreal to St. John's, NF, Shannon, Ireland, Crete, Cairo, India, island hop across the Pacific to Honolulu, then San Francisco to Montreal.

Among the employees involved were: Jean Marc Belanger, Vincent Calonne, Gerry Cline, Claude LaPierre, Neil Livingstone, Yves Picard, Norm Reid, Art Sroka, Luigi Corso, Bob Van Den Hoef, George Hewitt, Bill Alexander, John Topiniski, Vince Robinson, Maurice Gwin, Louis Bourque, Rick Dion, Adrien Vallieres, Russ Looker, Chris Moon, Hans Asam, Juan Melwani, Beverley Bracken, Barb Bonham, Steve Bulger, Wally Pacholka, Loretta Alexander, Louyse Gierden and Fraser Muir. 

(There is an organization named "Wings for Life" which does not appear to be related – eds)

Ron and his "Trekkies" hike pastoral England

Ron Barber, leading his eighth annual "trek", was joined by a gang of seven others from the Toronto Finance and Reservations decided to tackle the Lake District which seemed, from the report by John Cavill, to be a hike which turned into a "pub crawl separated by lake, crag and fell", according to the diary of Patrick Sullivan. Named cultural establishments visited were "Crown & Hen", " White Lion", "Golden Rule", "The Yewdale", the "Bull" and "Travellers Rest".

We have this photo of the "Trekkies" taken by Mark Groskaufmanis who was on his seventh such "Trek".

From the left: Patrick Sullivan, Shirley Samuel, Ron Barber, Suzy Trumpour, Carolyn Chamandy and Nancy Wahlroth.

Missing from the action and recovering from the previous day's hike was Lois Nelson.

(Probably taking in the "Travellers Rest" liquid opportunities to do just that - eds).

Found in the "New Horizons" magazine issue dated May 2005. (with permission)

enRoute magazine got a facelift effective with the May issue to reflect Air Canada's new brand image.

(April 2005) - The 10th anniversary of "Dreams Take Flight" departed Winnipeg in early April with a flight to Walt Disney World in Florida. Two aircraft carried the largest group of children - 153 - in the program's Winnipeg history up to this date.

Our photo has some of the volunteer employees who helped to make the trip successful.

From the left: Evelyn Gelger, Winnipeg Flight Attendant; Nicole Carnegie, Airport Customer Sales Agent; Jennifer Biebrich, Winnipeg Flight Attendant and Harold Bateman, Winnipeg DTF V.P. and Customer Sales Agent, Reservations.

From the Canadi>n AirCargo annual report 1991.

During 1991, Calgary employees celebrate winning the Service Quality Award.

(Unfortunately no names were supplied - anyone care to provide some names? - eds)

TSSC network completes.

The opening of the Vancouver Telephone Sales and Service Center (TSSC) in April 1991 made the TSSC network complete. Along with YUL, YYZ and YYC, Canadi>n Air Cargo customers across Canada are getting speedy and efficient telephone service.

In our photo from the left are: Doug Thornson, Hope-Ann Weidman, Fred Whiting, Ian McLafferty, David Knight, Murray Armstrong, Ken Mok, Gillian Brough and Patrick Cheung. 

Missing are Shirley Cherry, Heather Johannson, John Lynch and Geoff Packham.

The Hong Kong Canadi>n Cargo staff took over the work from a former contract operator.

This was the staff in June 1991, from the left in front: Raymond Lai, Simon Chan, Dennis Tse and Francis Law.

Back row: John Gibson, Terry Wong, Roy Yip, David Chin, Taley Cheung, Salome Yeung, Al Ridgway, Jacob Wong, Tommy Yu, Samuel Lee, Alfred Chui and Daniel Ngan.

Air Cargo initiated its own special recognition program for 1991, imprinting ULD's with the names of employees who went "above and beyond the call of duty" in providing exceptional customer service.

The winners were: Gordon Darling, YVR; Lance Hoopai, HNL; Genie Simeona, HNL; Richard Takamoto, HNL; Fran Perverseff, YYZ; Edna Wilson, YYT; Garry Handel, YYC; John O'Handley, YYZ; George Klss, YVR and David Harms, YKA.

Dave Shore comments on Wayne's Wings article from NetLetter # 1382.

A similar restaurant to the Flying Beaver is the Flying Otter in Victoria's Inner Harbour. It's on the Harbour Air docks and has spectacular views not just of the seaplane action (Harbour Air and also Kenmore Air to the U.S) but also views of the Empress Hotel, Parliament Buildings and the old CPR steamship building.

Other transportation activities on view are the Victoria Clipper (catamaran service to Seattle), the MV Coho (ferry to Port Angeles) and the small harbour ferries. It's a great place for transportation buffs.

Photo by Joe Mabel from Flickr.

For the Vickers Viscount aficionados.

Robert Arnold has sent us this information regarding some old TCA/AC Viscounts.

The Royal Aviation Museum of Western Canada (Winnipeg) has the only Viscount done in full red and white Air Canada livery. The BC Aviation Museum (YYJ) has the only “White Top” Trans-Canada Air Lines Viscount and the National in Ottawa has the only “Bare Metal” Viscount, CF-THI, in Trans-Canada Air Lines livery. Ex Air Canada Viscount, CF-TID-X is still around but not in any airline markings.

This Viscount still wears the blue and white colours of Pratt and Whitney and is currently being used as a fire training aid by the St. Hubert Airport folks. Not sure how, but apparently they do this somehow without doing any damage to the aircraft itself.

Good on them I say. The website, vickersviscount.net, has the history for all Viscounts built.

Robert Arnold.

We, at the NetLetter, recently read an article in the Flight International Magazine about the Bristol Freighter - remember that one?

There are only 11 surviving examples of the 214 built. TCA had 3, and I know a bunch went to New Zealand Air Force. The one which was at Ardmore airport since 1978 and has been bought by the Aerospace Bristol Museum at Filton in the UK. The aircraft was stripped and is being shipped to the UK.

This information was sent to Norman Hogwood, a reader living in New Zealand as there was reference to Ardmore airport in New Zealand.

Here is a memory from Norman -

I didn’t realize TCA had them. Yes, the RNZAF had a fleet but the biggest user of them in NZ was Straits Air Freight Express (SAFE) who were based in Blenheim at the top of the South Island.

Full details of this airline can be found in Wikipedia. It was once partly owned by NAC and then wholly owned by Air NZ after the merger. My NAC Safety Manager boss and I had an occasion to visit SAFE once and while we took an NAC F27 to Blenheim, we were offered a ride home in the lumbering brute.

Being an ex-737 skipper, my boss was invited to the flight deck upstairs. I took the only seat downstairs in one of the “cabins”. In the next “cabin” was a massive prize bull! The B170 was sometimes known as thirty thousand rivets flying in formation! My ex-Air NZ Safety Manager boss actually flew them in the RNZAF in Singapore during the Malayan crisis.

Click Here (or on image below) for a YouTube video of the Bristol Type 170 being loaded on haulage vehicles for transportation to the docks for its return to the UK. It had been left unprotected for years so let’s hope it has a happier time in Bristol.

Cheers. Norm

Mike Nash shares this memory with us -

Further to ‘Sound Breaking’ in the January 15, 2018 issue of NetLetter, #1382, and the photograph of the prototype Concorde 001, under "Odds and Ends", that was rolled out 50 years ago in December 1967. Last year I realized a lifelong ambition to see a total solar eclipse, which my wife and I did in Idaho on August 21, 2017 (For an account of this trip Click Here).

In researching what became known as ‘The Great American Eclipse’ I came across an interesting item concerning this same aircraft. For most total solar eclipses, the period of totality lasts two or three minutes, with the record being a little over seven minutes. Astronomers will sometimes extend this by a few minutes in jet aircraft, as was the case with NASA aircraft in this recent event. The longest eclipse in over a thousand years occurred on June 30, 1973 over the Sahara, lasting up to 7 mins 4 secs on the ground.

For this event, the original Concorde 001 prototype aircraft, then nearing the end of its successful test program, was modified with the installation of several small quartz windows in the roof and flown with astronomers and specialized instrumentation, achieving totality for 74 minutes, the longest ever from near the surface of the Earth.

The idea had been warmly welcomed by the prototype’s owners as a way to show off the unique capabilities of the new aircraft. This has never been repeated as there are currently no aircraft with the range, speed and size of the Concorde. This is event is well portrayed in this YouTube video. (click below)

Mike Nash

From "via Larry Milberry/CANAV Books". (with permission)
www.canavbooks.wordpress.com

Great things developed for Trans-Canada Air Lines early after the war. New aircraft like the DC-3 and North Star were the biggest change, allowing for a much expanded route structure.

More than 20 newly rebuilt DC-3s were delivered by Canadair starting in 1945, so the well-worn fleet of Lockheeds was sold. This basic “advert” tells the story. No doubt the planes went at give-away prices. For their new role as corporate planes, the basic old TCA Lockheeds were gutted, then rebuilt with swish interiors. As such, they served into the early 1960s – Rolls-Royces of the airways, the granddaddies of today’s Global Express.

BAE Systems and the University of Manchester have flown a stealth drone that has no control surfaces and therefore does not change shape in flight. The MAGMA drone uses blown air to change aerodynamics and allow three-axes control. The most obvious benefit from the innovation is that there is no deflection of control surfaces to reflect radar but there may be some advantages to the flying barn doors that most aircraft represent on radar. The new system is apparently a lot simpler than the collection of mechanical devices that manipulate airflow around flying surfaces. Click here for full article.

(Source: AVwenFlash December 17, 2017)

Terry Baker, co-founder of the NetLetter scours the internet for aviation related Trivia and Travel Tips for you, our readers, to peruse.

Please note the (Air Canada) insignia embossed on the North Star Flight Bulletin December 25, 1948 as shown in the en-Route magazine, 1987 50th anniversary edition. 

(Can anyone throw any light on this item? - eds)

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Ways to avoid paying too much to travel. (Source: MSN.COM)

Flying Out During Off-Season

If you’re looking to save big-time on travel, think about planning your vacations for the off-season. Consider the benefits beyond the slashed prices: less chaos at the airport, quieter resort grounds and enough in savings to consider planning another trip sooner than expected!

Skipping the Travel Insurance

It’s easy to skip the box that cites travel insurance when booking your flights, but never ignore the very real possibility that if something goes wrong, you’ve just denied yourself any kind of safety net. Travel insurance has come a long way (you may not even realize the coverage offered by your Credit Card Company or personal health insurance until you ask). Even a basic insurance plan will help protect you from not just health issues, but things like trip cancellation and lost luggage.

Vancouver Interline Club was formed on February 28th 1967.

A formation meeting was held at the Newsmen's Club with 12 airlines represented.

Elected were Evelyn Dunning (CPAL), President; Ron Groves (SAS), Vice President; Alma Kelly, Secretary; V. Patterson (JAL), Treasurer.

The 50th Anniversary Celebration was held on May 5th, 2017 at the Richmond Curling Club, Richmond, British Columbia.

(Source: VIC web site)

Our Dave Mathias cartoon appeared in the "Between Ourselves" magazine issued June 1956.

The caption is "First, gentlemen, let me show you what drives men through untold hardships in their struggle to conquer the skies... the pay cheque!"

The lighter side.

Irate passenger; “This is the worst run airline. I don't know why you even bother to publish a schedule!”
Flight attendant; “Well, we need something to base our delays on”.

(Source: The Senior Paper January 2018)