Aviation Memorabilia Newsletter

Issue dated - December 1951
Extracted from "Between Ourselves" magazine

The Birth of a Jet - Submitted by Bill Wood.

This is a 13 minute video extolling the virtues of the DC-8 when it first flew. There is some footage of the LB plant before Boeing and the Douglas Airpark.  It's a great video on the DC-8 and is a vintage '50's production.

I found it interesting that they were doing stress testing underwater.

 Ah, the good old days.  Turn on your sound and enjoy some aviation
 nostalgia.

DC-8 Promo Movie

News and articles from days gone by gleaned from various publications from C.A.I.L. and it's "ancestry" of contributing airlines.

Help wanted by Glen Jeffrey regarding Terrace -.
Can anyone out there provide me with information regarding the construction of the Terrace B.C. military base and the adjacent Woodcock B.C. emergency base used if Terrace was down with weather problems.

I was based there for some time and the Terrace locals want a write up on YXT for their history books. The info I have gleaned so far is that it was built for defense against the threat of invasion from Japan and apparently a squadron of Hawker Hurricane aircraft and probably some Harvard trainers were also in use.

Apparently there was 2 large wood construction hangars, one was in use when I was there and it was large enough to hangar our DC6B, this hangar has now burned down the source of the fire unknown and the other one dismantled and moved to Smithers B.C. for a skating rink.

If anyone has any info on the history and construction of this base I would appreciate it so that I can pass it on to the people of Terrace as any of the locals now in YXT who were involved have become real seniors and their memories have been blurred in this regard. 

Best regards to all Glenn Jeffrey
Please respond to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Ken Pickford sends us this information -
NetLetter #1129 includes a photo of what the caption states was CF-CPI, the first of CPA's four Canadair C-4s, c/n 147.

The aircraft in the photo is definitely not CF-CPI. The round windows indicate that it was almost certainly the unpressurized RCAF North Star leased by CPA for a few months in 1949. It operated the North Pacific survey flight to Tokyo, Shanghai and Hong Kong in April 1949, prior to commencement of regular service a few months later.

The round windows on the aircraft in the photo were only used on the unpressurized North Stars operated by the RCAF. Six of those RCAF aircraft, including the one briefly leased by CPA, were also loaned to TCA for about a year from 1947 to 1948 while TCA was awaiting delivery of their pressurized North Stars which had the same larger rectangular windows as the DC-6. CPA's four C-4s (CPA didn't use the North Star name) were also the pressurized version.

Scroll up in the same NetLetter issue to the photo of the TCA North Star used on the first transatlantic flight from Toronto and will see the rectangular windows of the pressurized North Star/C-4. CF-CPI would have looked like that aircraft. I would thus guess that the photo in question was taken sometime prior to the April 1949 North Pacific survey flight.

The aircraft leased by CPA, and presumably the one in the photo, was c/n 106 and was registered CF-TEP while temporarily used by both TCA and CPA. Its RCAF serial was 17522. Its RCAF service ended in 1954 when it was written off in a non-fatal landing accident in England.

The real CF-CPI, named Empress of Sydney, operated the pre-inaugural flight for guests and dignitaries from Vancouver to Honolulu, Nadi and Sydney (with fuel stops at San Franciso and Canton Island) on July 10, 1949. The survey flight on that route a few days earlier used CF-CPR (Empress of Vancouver), the second of CPA's C-4s. CF-CPR had a short lifespan as it was written off in a non-fatal landing overrun into the water at Tokyo in February 1950.

The three surviving CPA C-4s (CF-CPI/CPJ/CPP) were sold to TCA in 1952 and replaced with used Douglas DC-4s acquired from Pan Am. At TCA, the ex-CPA aircraft became CF-TFU/TFV/TFW. The last of those, CF-TFW, collided with an RCAF Harvard over Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan on April 8, 1954 while en route from Winnipeg to Calgary. All 35 passengers and crew on the North Star were killed, as was the Harvard pilot and one person on the ground in a house in Moose Jaw that was struck by falling wreckage.

Regards, Ken Pickford

The NetLetter gang responded -

Hello Ken,
We appreciate you taking the time to document the story surrounding the Canadair aircraft. As indicated in the NetLetter, the information came from the Canadian Flyer April 1999.

BAe146-200 c/n 2133 fin 204 C-GRNV ex AC now with Aerolineas Star Peru.
BAe146-200 c/n 2121 fin 210 C-FBAV ex Jazz now with Avmax Canada
c/n 2140 fin 206 C-GRNT ex Jazz now with Avmax Canada
 
Barry Crawford sends this information, (slightly edited)  -
 I do look forward to receiving "thenetletter" every week. I don't know if any of you have watched the series "Ice Pilots" on the History Channel. I just finished watching the series and found it very entertaining. I really enjoyed the different aircraft being flown by Buffalo Airways.

By the way does  anyone  know the owner of Buffalo Airways, Joe McBryan or any of the pilots? Is your readership aware of this series.......if not......I bet some of your readers would enjoy watching. Keep up the good work with the newsletter.
Barry

Traveling to Europe?  - here is a scheme you may be able to take advantage of -
Q What is the Retail Export Scheme?
A As a non-European visitor to the European Union you will pay VAT on most things you buy. The Retail Export Scheme allows you to claim a VAT Refund on most goods you intend to export from the European Union. You must export them by the last day of the third month following that in which the goods were purchased.
 
And if you want some funds exchanged for your travels in Europe - try this web site -
www.travelex.co.uk
 
Departure tax at Dublin is euro10.00 per passenger.
 
We continue the trip to the far east, extracted from the UK Pionairs monthly newsletter July edition -
Our Far East Adventure:    (Jack and Aureen Morath  -  Continued)
The next morning we explored the local area before taking the tram to the city centre. It cost 1 Hong Kong Dollar each way as we were Seniors.  Everyone else is charged 2 dollars. Every Sunday the city is filled with  Phillipinos who meet up with each other and so it was on our visit. We headed back to our hotel for lunch. An excellent buffet lunch at a special price for Seniors! In the afternoon we took the hotel shuttle bus to the harbour area to do a "dummy run" to the cruise terminal which we would be doing the following day. The shuttle bus driver dropped us off at the Star Ferry Terminal and we took the famous Star Ferry across to the mainland. At the ticket office we were told that the ferry was free to Seniors. The ferry runs every few minutes and only takes a few minutes for the journey. Once over the other side it was only a few hundred yards walk to the modern Cruise Terminal. We checked out our check-in procedures so we would know exactly what to do the following day. After a walk around Kowloon we returned on the ferry and then on to the tram back to our hotel. We were now all set for our cruise the following day. (to be continued)

• Chief Pilot - Terry Baker, Nanaimo, B.C.
• Co-Pilot - Alan Rust, Surrey, B.C.
• Ground Technician - Bill Rowsell, Londesboro, Ontario