A pictorial description of the ranks insignial of the Royal Canadian Air Force, during the period 1939 - 1945
Dictionaries define the word 'ace' as a combat pilot who has shot down five or more enemy aeroplanes. The French, who originated this expression during World War I when "dog-fighting" was on a man-to-man basis, reached back into the days of chivalry when two knights on horseback, armed with lances, jousted.
The formation of Second Tactical Air Force (2nd T.A.F.) on June 1 1943, gave birth to 143 Wing, R.C.A.F. on 10th January 1944. Like all wings in T.A.F. its role was to support the army in the field.
The following is a transcript of a talk given by W/C Russell Bannock DSO, DFC and Bar (RCAF Ret'd) at the Annual CAHS Banquet held 30 May 1981 at the Skyline Hotel near the Toronto International Airport.
Like so many places on the Canadian prairies, both large and small, the city of Prince Albert made a distinctive contribution to Canada's effort in the Second World War by training pilots and navigators under the British Commonwealth Air Training Plan.
That the following story appeared in the English aviation weekly, the Aeroplane, for, 5 January of 1945 "I explain the style with its insistent optimism and ready propaganda, both very typical of published wartime material. Also typical is the studied omission of any identification of actual squadrons - even at such a late date, well after the event.
Canada's first "Warplane" warplane was a monumental military misfit. The first direct attempt to interest Canada's military men in aircraft had been a dismal failure...
The sonnet HIGH FLIGHT is known through out the English-speaking world, epitomizing, as it does, the poetry and emotion of flight. It was written by a 19- year old American fighter pilot of the Royal Canadian Air Force a few months before his death.
Flying Officer H. Jones was the captain of a Dakota aircraft detailed to drop parachute troops in the Caen area on the night of 5/6 June 1944. The approach was made at a height of 600 feet above ground, in the face of heavy anti-aircraft fire. Approximately four miles from the Dropping Zone the aircraft was badly hit and set on fire.
The Mid-Canada Line, an Air Defence Early Warning Line stretching across Canada's 55th parallel of latitude from Labrador to British Columbia, became operational in January 1958.
Need for a new fighter aircraft (NFA) for the Canadian Armed Forces to replace first the McDonnell CF-101 Voodoo and later the Lockheed / Canadair CF-104 Starfighter stems from Canada's withdrawal from the "multi-role combat aircraft for 1975" (MRCA-75) that became the Panavia Tornado, now serving with the British, German and Italian air forces.
A solo, aerobatics performer of the Royal Canadian Air Force’s Training Command from 1958 through 1969, the role of the Red Knight was actually shared by seventeen different pilots over a period of twelve seasons.