100 Year of flight

As this year marks the 100 year anniversary of controlled, manned, powered flight in Canada it was decided to have a celebratory fly over the nations capital on Saturday Feb 21. I am proud to say that I was the representative RV that went along.
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My home base (CYSH) is about 1/2 hr flight from the airport (CYRO) where the planes were to meet for the pilot briefing. My 9 year old son, Mitchell,[IMG][URL=http://img179.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mitchellcontroller.jpg][IMG]http://img179.imageshack.us/img179/3729/mitchellcontroller.jpg[/IMG][/URL][/IMG] was my copilot. The weather this time of year is anything but predictable. The stars must have aligned because we got a perfect day after a week of lousy weather followed by another week of predicted lousy weather.

I got there early to clear the snow off my apron and add a bit of eye candy to the plane. I became an ace that day with 5 kills. I wanted to use some politically correct symbol for the kills but the Japanese flag is so good looking for this purpose that I used it anyway.
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A Cessna 421, piloted by Bob Hanson and Copilot Andrew Boyd, and I would be a flight of 2 on the way over. Andrew gave me a brief on how to fly loose formation with them and soon we were off. I was very happy with the formation work and Andrew's briefing made it so that everything went like clockwork. Although warned about the wake turbulence off the 421, I got a first hand experience when, near our destination, I tucked in behind them about a mile back and got tossed around pretty good. Picture by Mitchell!
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We landed at CYRO which is attached to our National Aviation Museum. My plane got lots of attention on the ground. All the landings went well except for one tail dragger which ground looped on the runway and lost a wheel. We all headed inside for our brief.

This flyby was to be broken into several groups, commercial, military and GA. The GA were then subdivided into fast and slower aircraft. The most important part of the brief was handled by Mike Bourget, a former 8 builder, who now flies a Nanchang. He is an ATC and probably the only one there who actually had formation qualifications. He took a rag tag assembly of GA pilots with a wide range of planes and an even wider range of experience and gave them good rules to live by and govern our safety. Finally we were ready to go.

Out on the runway the first group of twins (3 planes) were ready to go. Suddenly the nose wheel on the 421 came off and the plane was grounded while sitting just behind the numbers. It was quickly decided that the show must go on and the remaining aircraft departed while arrangements were made to get a tug for the wounded bird.

Here is where things get interesting. Ottawa in not a huge city. To the south of the show area is the international airport with it's normal business operations. To the east of the show are 20+ GA aircraft now heading west to pass show center then 180 degree turn to enter the planned flight path. To the west of the show was the holding area for larger commercial aircraft all the way up to F-18's at various altitudes. On top of that it was a rare beautiful Saturday so many training and pleasure aircraft were also up. The flight over the city seemed to go without a hitch. We were allowed to fly at 1500'. My wife, on the ground, wasn't able to tell my plane from the others...oh well. At the end of the show we departed to the east to recover at CYRO. Not good! The runway was still closed. All the GA planes from the show headed east and suddenly they all needed transponder codes. I called the terminal control ATC and told him I needed to go southwest. Here is sort of how that conversation went.

Controller: whats your squawk code
Me: Don't have one
Controller: where did you say you want to go
Me: CYSH
Him: you can't go there it's way too busy, wait, where are you, wait a minute let me see if I can get you a code...squawk 4558
SILENCE
Him; you couldn't be in a worse place...your right on the flight path of the International airport, don't go above 2000' and get out of there as fast as you can. Maintain your current heading.
Me: CYRO is closed due to an accident thats why I am here!
Him: Thanks for the info

The 20+ aircraft all leaving the show came on one after the other. It was fun to listen to. The best was a non participant who entered into the training area where the big planes were holding and requested a block of airspace to practice aerobatics. He picked the wrong day for that request.

The flight back home was uneventful after that although the bumpy air at the low altitude made my son feel a bit motion sick. It was an enjoyable day. I regret that I was not able to fly near or even see the P-51 but hopefully there will be other days. The formation work was really the most enjoyable part of the flight and hopefully I may be able to get training for this in the future. The whole thing was very well organized and I was glad to be able to be a part of it. I doub't I will fly in the next 100 year celebration!