=================================================================
|
|\^/|
T H E _| TCA |_
_|\| AIR |/|_
N E T L E T T E R > CANADA <
>_./|\._<
|
( For retirees of the new Air Canada family)
Number 506 July 25th, 2000, We first Published in October 1995
Chief Pilot - Vesta Stevenson - Co-pilot - Terry Baker
email address is
================================================================
. Need to know.
Changes to selected Employee Travel products means better service for employees.
Effective today, Air Canada will implement several changes to Employee Travel
products—service side—which should result in a 40% reduction in call wait times.
Agents at Air Canada’s General Reservations at (888) 247-2262 will process Family Affair and personal standby travel registration for self-ticketing active and retired Air Canada, Air Canada Regional Carrier, Canadian Airlines, and Canadian Regional Airlines employees.
Employee Call Centre (ECC) agents will handle all other employee travel services,
such as business and crew travel, ID/ZED fare requests, parent/partner passes, and personal standby travel registration for non-self ticketing active and retired Air Canada and Air Canada Regional Carrier employees. ECC agents will also make Family Affair and personal travel registration for self-ticketing employees—however, we hope employees will call General Reservations.
( Update Chapter 4.1 in 'Your Travel Guide' - eds)
*Air Canada’s operational performance for the week of July 17-23:
Passenger load factor: 82%
Employee Communications, YULNNAC
|
'---o-o-0-o-o---'
" ' "
. We are publishing some of the stories from early NetLetters, This one from
Charles Mackie in nr 61 dated May 18th, 1996 --
. Charles Mackie at
of his experiences in the Lancastrian aircraft in the early days of T.C.A.
The information was supplied to an author for planned publication.
The following is one -
The Autopilot couldn't hold it - Oct 1945
There was a time we got as far as Three Rivers heading outwards and, for some
reason, we had to feather one of the engines. We were heading back to Montreal
to get the situation rectified. The first officer was flying and had it on automatic pilot.
The autopilot could not hold the aircraft on three engines, and the aircraft all of a
sudden went into a steep spiral dive. It was several thousand feet before we
recovered and got things back to normal.
and , in nr 62 dated June 2nd 1996, Al Blackwood gave this follow up -
As a followup to the story from Charles Mackie in Nr 61,
Al Blackwood at
The experience Charlie had with the auto pilot brought back memories of a similar
amusing incident. All of the Lancasters had British auto pilots except one which had
one made by GE and had a bad habit of putting the aircraft into a dive without
warning.
This had been reported several times but always came back "unable to duplicate".
One day we were in Prestwick and the GE rep happened to be there so it was
arranged to take the aircraft up for a test flight. We were all strapped in but the
GE rep was standing behind the pilots. We were cruising in level flight with
the auto pilot on for about twenty minutes with everything normal when all of a
sudden the nose pitched down and the rep went up to the ceiling with a surprised
look on his face! Needless to say he was finally convinced there was a problem.
It wouldn't surprise me if it was the same aircraft that Charles was in.
|
'---o-o-0-o-o---'
" ' "
. News from the districts -
From the Spring newsletter of Manitoba and Saskatchewan district
issued by Stephanie Mandzie -
The spring luncheon was held on April 13th at the Viscount Gort Hotel.
The Skyliners Toastmasters Club held there 50th Reunion at the same location on
May 15th. The original membership was believed to be 100% of Trans-Canada Air
Lines employees.
Keith Richards, 50th Anniversary Committee would like to hear from any former
employees of TCA or Air Canada who were members of the club - the intention was
to have them attend the reunion, but, unfortunately this information has only just
reached us.
Those charter members on May 22nd 1950 were -
R.D.A.Graham, J.P.Anderson, F.M.Miniely, G.W.Lawson, N.R.Hodgson,
O.F.H.Bradley,
R.S.A.Lewis, D.F.Atkinson, L.R.J.Sheffield, F.M.Romaniuk, J.G.Stephens, J.Speid,
J.O.Griffith, C.Fuller, W.F.Moore, L.Cleghorn, R.H.Clifford, G.A.Gilbert, J.Lane,
J.M.Smith, J.Gilles, H.C.Thompson, A.J.Symes, R.E.Rogers, A.R.Hunt, W.Cook,
G.Lalonde and P.E.Lamoureaux.
Keith Richards can be reached at (204)888-5786 or fax (204)589-6114
From the Ottawa district newsletter -
Past events -
Thursday April 20th was the Kingston Satellite luncheon held at
the Minos Restaurant.
Saturday May 6th was the Ottawa luncheon with the theme "Dreams Take Flight".
Among the prizes were a painting donated by Kay Cox, and Bob Robbins
donated some mint postage stamps issued by Barbados depicting Air Canada
B767 and A320 aircraft. All proceeds from the draw and silent auction were
given to the "Dreams take Flight" towards the September trip to Disneyland.
The Friday morning koffee klatches run each week 10:00 - 11:00 at the
Family Restaurant, Carlingwood Shopping Centre in Ottawa.
The Alexandria Pionairs meet monthly on the 2nd Wednesday. All Pionairs
welcome. Call Cam Evans (613)224-6469 or Graham Richardson (613)874-2850.
The Montreal Pionairs have suggested a joint luncheon for September, possibly
in Morrisburg.
Jim Bain was, posthumously inducted into the Canadian Aviation Hall of Fame at
Wetaskiwin, Alta and takes his place with other TCA/AC Pionairs namely:
R.J.(Ron) Baker, P.Y.(Paul) Davoud, R.L.Dodds, J.T.(Jack)Dyment, J.H.Foy,
W.(Walt)Fowler, H.(Bertie)Hollick-Kenyon, H.H.(Her) Hopson, H.M.(Harry)Kennedy,
Z.L.(Lewie)Leigh, G.B.(George)Lothian, R.B.Middleton, M.W.(Mac) MacLeod,
D.R.(Don)MacLaren, G.R.(Gordon)McGregor, R.(Ronald) Peel, P.G.Powell,
B.A.(Barney)Rawson, L.(Lindy) Rood, H.W.(Herb)Seagrim, F.E.M.(Frank) Smith,
C.I.(Claude) Taylor, J.H.(Tuddy)Tudhope and F.I.(Frank) Young.
If you have an interest in Canadian Aviation, the Museum's recent publication is
"They led the way". cost ca$36.50. A binder for up-dating the details of future
inductees costs ca$22.50. From Canada's Aviation Hall of Fame, P.O.Box 6360,
Wetaskiwin, Alta, T9A 2G1
|
'---o-o-0-o-o---'
" ' "
. Famous quotes -
Our A320 behaved even better than expected -- it is both delightfully responsive
and reassuringly stable to fly, qualities which fly-by-wire brings together for the first
time in an airliner. Never before have we enjoyed a first flight so much, and we are
confident that airline pilots well feel the same way.
-- Pierre Baud, first flight of a fully fly-by-wire airliner.
|
'---o-o-0-o-o---'
" ' "
. For the Lockheed L1011 affectionados -
From the YYZNEWS issued by Brian Dunn -
The two ex-Royal Airlines L-1011s which had been sitting parked at Montreal-Dorval
airport for the last couple of years after they had been returned from leases in Chile
were broken up for scrap recently. The first aircraft in May, and the last one by the
end of June.
Both these aircraft were ex-Air Canada.
CF-TNI fin 509 s/n 1058 delivered Jan 22/74, stored in Marana Nov '90,
leased to Royal Airlines Jun 93, then leased to Chile Inter as CC-CZF, returned to
Royal in 1999 and registered as C-GGBL. Broken up July 2000.
CF-TNK fin 511 s/n 1069 delivered Mar 23/74, leased to Air Lanka Dec 29/81 as 4R-TNK,
returned Sept 26/82. Stored at Marana Nov 1990, Sold to Sunquest Travel Sept 12/93
who leased to Royal Airlines Sept 27/93, to Chile Inter Jan 1998, as CC-CZR,
returned to Royal 1999 and broken up May 2000.
|
'---o-o-0-o-o---'
" ' "
. Thirteen airlines form industry’s largest business-to-business exchange—initiative spearheaded by Air Canada. Thirteen of the world’s major airlines announce the creation of the airline industry’s largest business-to-business (B2B) e-commerce exchange—Aeroxchange. It will offer the most comprehensive selection of aircraft technical parts and services, as well as general business supplies to airlines on the web. The airline group’s founding members, with representation of the Board of Directors are Air Canada, All Nippon Airways, America West Airlines, Cathay Pacific Airways, FedEx Express, Japan Airlines, Lufthansa, Northwest Airlines, SAS, and Singapore Airlines, with confirmed participation from Air New Zealand, Austrian Airlines, and KLM Royal Dutch Airlines. Global in scope, with founding member airlines in Asia-Pacific, North America, and Europe, it’s estimated the new exchange will handle US $45 billion annually of the current 13 airlines’ purchases of goods and services, excluding aircraft and fuel.
|
'---o-o-0-o-o---'
" ' "
. From the YYZNEWS issued by Brian Dunn -
Anyone seeing publicity photos of the Dash 8-400 in the new flower/disk colour scheme for Bombardier will now see this aircraft in a new colour scheme just in time for the Farnborough Air Show that started on July 20th. This particular aircraft is a Dash 8-400 sn 4004. The aircraft was originally painted in Bombardier house colours for flight testing and then in SAS Commuter colours for some SAS pilot training in Wichita. After the training SAS requested that Bombardier remove the SAS titles, which it did and the aircraft continued its flight test program until about 4 weeks ago when it arrived in Toronto. It went to Pearson's refurbishment center for a new interior and for some mod work which included an engine change in order to have it certified to do passenger demo flights when it arrived in Farnborough. A/C 4004 departed YYZ about 1 1/2 weeks ago for a short flight to DeHavilland's plant at Downsview where the aircraft was repainted again into Augsburg Airways colours (Team Lufthansa).
On Monday July 17th it flew senior management of Air Canada to Montreal on a demo flight. Another demo flight was then done in Montreal on the same day for other staff members. It is almost confirmed that Air Canada (or its regional) will purchase twelve Dash 8-400s along with some-200 and -300 aircraft in the same order to be announced shortly. (Perhaps at the Farnborough airshow?) The aircraft then flew to Halifax and then back to Montreal and then flew the president of Air Nova (Joe Randall) from Montreal back to Halifax on a demo flight. The aircraft was expected to depart on July 19 for Stansted via Gander and Reykjavik Iceland. It will do several more demo flights out of Stansted for local operators and then fly into Farnborough for the business and air show. After Farnborough it depart for a 2 1/2 week European demo tour that will take it to 40 cities performing 2 demo flights a day over this period. After that it is expected to return to the refurbishment center in Toronto for mod work to return it to a customer production configuration.
Air Alliance (aka Air Georgian) has announced that it will commence the first-ever non-stop air service between Toronto and Manchester NH on August 21st. There will be three departures every business day. Air Alliance is the marketing name for Air Georgian who operate under the Air Ontario operations blanket and feed into Air Canada's hub at YYZ.
Air Canada has decided to follow the trend set by Canada 3000 and other airlines by providing round-the-clock air-to-ground medical support to their customers through MedAire's Emergency Telemedicine Serivce, Medlink. The airline has also decided to equip its fleet with automated external defibrillators (AEDs).
|
'---o-o-0-o-o---'
" ' "
. Tom Grant ends this -
Information on the Farnborough Air Show being held July 24-30th can be had by
visiting the web site at
http://www.farnborough.com/
From the YYZNEWS issued by Brian Dunn, the orders for aircraft are pouring in -
AIRBUS INDUSTRIE
a) CIT Group ordered 35 A320 family aircraft and 15 A330 (including the possible
launch of the A330-500 version.)
b) Emirates Airlines -- confirmed orders for 5 of the new A3XX jumbo jet and five
options.
c) Airbus formally announced the launch of the new A3XX jumbo jet.
BOEING COMMERCIAL AIRCRAFT
a) All Nippon ordered 6 new 777-300 Longer Range version (2 new orders, and 4
converted from straight -300 model) Delivery 2004-2007.
b) ILFC -- 8 B777-200/300 Longer Range
- 25 B777-200ER Delivery 2002-2009
- 7 B737NG Delivery 2003-2005
c) GE CAPITAL -- 10 b777-200/300 Longer Range + 5 options
- 5 B777-200ER + 2 options (Delivery 2001-2007)
- 65 B737NG (6 of these previously announced as "anonymous"
+ 52 options.
BOMBARDIER AEROSPACE
a) ASA -- 10 more CRJ200 (Delivery Sep/2001 to Aug/2002) To replace
EMB120s traded in to Bombardier.
b) Delta Connection -- 79 CRJ200, 25 CRJ700 (previously announced)
c) China Yunnan Airlines -- 10 CRJ200
d) Shandong Airlines -- 10 CRJ700
e) Brit Air (France) -- 8 CRJ700
f) SAS Commuter -- 6 DHC8-Q400 (additional order)
g) Tyrolean Airways -- 1 DHC8-Q400 (additional order)
Confirmed previous order for 3 CRJ200
h) UNI Air (Taiwan) -- 1 DHC8-Q300
i) Undisclosed customer -- 1 DHC8-Q200 and 1 Q300
Bombardier announced the official launch of their new CRJ model 900 at the Air show
with the following orders;
a) Tyrolean Airways -- Letter Of Intent for 12 CRJ900
b) Air Nostrum (Spain) -- Letter Of Intent for 8 CRJ900
c) GECAS -- 10 CRJ900 orders + 20 options
ALLIANCE AIRCRAFT CORPORATION (New Hampshire)
This is a new company proposing to build a new family of regional jet aircraft called the "Starliner". They announced at the show that Global Airlines has ordered 250 as firm orders, with 200 options and 100 "rolling options". The -200 and -300 series aircraft will begin delivery in 2003 and the -100 series aircraft with 35 to 50 seats will begin delivery in 2004.
|
'---o-o-0-o-o---'
" ' "
. Smilie.
Air Traffic Control Information
A Huey Cobra practicing autorotations during a military night training exercise had a
problem and landed on the tail rotor, separating the tail boom. Fortunately, it wound up on its skids, sliding down the runway doing 360s in a brilliant shower of sparks. As the
Cobra passed the tower, the following exchange was overheard:
Tower: "Sir, do you need any assistance?"
Cobra: "I don't know, tower. We ain't done crashin' yet!"
Shortly after boarding a United Airlines flight from Denver to Phoenix, I listened to the
following exchange over the ATC channel of the plane's audio system after pushing back
from the gate:
Denver Ground: "United xxx, the good news is you are clear to taxi to Runway 16."
United xxx: "Uhh, thanks ... but what's the bad news?"
Denver Ground: "I don't have any bad news right now but the sooner you get going the less
chance there will be of my finding any."
|
'---o-o-0-o-o---'
" ' "
. DID YOU KNOW?
That you can read or retrieve back issues of "theNetLetter" ?
Just visit our web site at:
http://www.acfamily.net/netletter
and click on the "Archives" button.
This area is only open to "the NetLetter" subscribers and you will
need the following password to enter -
User Name: netletter Password: vesta
================================================================
Mailing of 'the NetLetter" is courtesy of Alan Rust administrator of
the "AC Family Network" at: http://www.acfamily.net
================================================================