:::: MITT ROMNEY :: A Real American vs.…

BARACK HUSSEIN OBAMA who other than being a Marxist American… we have no idea what he is.

As authentic Catholics… we do know… whatever, he may be… we don't want him—

::: Planespotting, er… Babespotting, er …Both!

GENTLEMEN… Plane-spotting is no longer an all-boy's club.

CERTAINLY, NOT in the Toronto-GTA (YYZ) area where BOTH airplane AND plane-spotter babe were captured by my VERY discriminating lens.

::: FLIGHT 621 :: RESOLUTION IS… on the Horizon for 2013.

SLOWLY, slowly.…

Ever, so slowly,  the cogs of progress move forward… and what once seemed like an impossibility is fast becoming reality as the 621 Field moves toward resolution.

Yes, by this time NEXT YEAR, the Flight 621 Cemetery and Memorial Park will be in place, and the horror of the AFTERMATH of that terrible day, will finally, FINALLY, be undone.

AIR CANADA promised, and later refused to build an on-site memorial to the 109 victims of Flight 621.

No matter.

Like it or not, that very memorial IS being built, RIGHT NOW.

 As I tap away at this keyboard…

Without Air Canada's sympathy.  Or support.

Of, course.

So… it's over Air Canard, your four decades of impasse and moral apathy failed in the end.  The deadlock IS being overthrown~

Feelin' kinda' tiny… feelin' kinda small… in the grand ole scheme of things?

Too bad Air Canada wasn't a family owned biz, instead of being run by turnstile execs.  A family would know the right thing to do, even now.


(Flight 621 crash arena photographed in summer of 2012.)

DISASTER for CANADIANS at DIEPPE! Betrayed by a Crossword Puzzle, Ninnies, and the BBC :::: 70 Years Ago in Canadian History!!

Well-trained fighting men.

CHECK.

Newest and the best contemporary military technology on land, sea, or in the air. 

CHECK.

Eager, fearless, and courageous Canadians, British, and American Infantry.

CHECK.

Hasty, cavalier plan of attack with unrealistic objectives (capture the port and hold it for two tides, gather intelligence from prisoners and captured material, lure the Luftwaffe into open battle, and steal German encryption equipment for Allied code-breakers) .

CHECK.

Imminent disaster for all involved.

CHECK. CHECK.

AUGUST 19, 1942…all of Europe was under Nazi domination.  

Ignoring that sobering point that should have been reflected upon…the Raid on the French coastal town of Dieppe began in earnest, at 5am…as 6,000 men storm the six beaches of Dieppe.

  

While Churchill and Admiral Mountbatten presumptuously oversaw and authorized the raid, months before General Montgomery had been firmly against raiding the French sea port, or any French sea port. He predicted disaster. However, and unfortunately for Canada, Montgomery was now in North Africa heading up the desert campaign…so cooler heads would not prevail in this August of '42, as the Canadian government and the Chiefs of Staff concurred with Churchill and Mountbatten to authorize the suicidal raid that consisted mostly of Canadians.

Since June, months before the ill-fated raid, the BBC had been warning the occupied French coastal towns to evacuate because war was coming to the neighbourhood.  Typical misguided leftist sympathies.  And what was the actual effect of these dire BBC radio warnings?  Did the French citizens leave?

Nope. 

But the Germans listened and dug in even deeper and reinforced the entire French coast against such an attack!  

Good one, BBC! 

Air recon units of the Nazi Luftwaffe confirmed a build up of Allied military activity along the Southern English coast, while simultaneously French double-agents warned of a British interest in Dieppe.

And to add a final stupidity to the mix, those emasculated Canadian and British military personnel ninnies that planned the Dieppe Raid felt they should play nice, avoid civilian losses, and not anger the traitorous collaborating Vichy government by letting the beach area reap the whirlwind.

So the trusting Canadians were expected to make a full frontal assault on those fortified  beaches of Dieppe without prior air and naval bombardment of the port city's defences!

Huh?

THAT was never done before.  Ever.

You always bomb the hell out of the landing point.

How do you spell die, as one of the Canadian soldiers from the 2nd Canadian Infantry noted while enroute to his demise at Dieppe?

"Why look the first three letters of Dieppe are D-I-E …" he noted ominously.

Two days before the raid, on August 17, former footballer turned high school teacher, Leonard Dawe compiled the Daily Telegraph crossword with the clue "French port".  The answer appeared in the English newspaper the following day.  The answer was Dieppe!

Was Dawe passing intelligence on to the enemy?

The War Office called up the Scot, Lord Tweedsmuir, who was then assisting the Canadian Army as a senior intelligence officer.  Dawe needed to be investigated.  Tweedsmuir called upon MI5, the counter-intelligence and security agency of Great Britain.

After an immediate and intense inquiry of Dawe, at his home, it was determined the crossword containing the solution, was a complete fluke, a MERE coincidence!

Dawe was cleared of any suspicion.

Fast forward to 1944, one month before D-Day.Another crossword coincidence authored by Dawe appears in the Telegraph.  This time there are multiple references to Operation Overlord, or D-Day, the Allied invasion of North Eastern Europe.  Heck, even Overlord appeared in the crossword on May 27!  Previous   Dawe crosswords had contained, Juno, Gold, Sword and Omaha which were all code names for beaches assigned to various Allied forces. Juno was the beach assigned to the Canadian attack force.  This was too much.  MI5 was again called in to investigate the crossword compiler, Dawe.

In the end it is again concluded that relevant invasion terms that appear in Dawe's Telegraph crossword were an explainable coincidence.

However, the general public didn't find out the "rest of the story" until 1958 when Dawe appeared in a BBC TV interview.  At the time, during the war, Dawe would encourage his school kids to come into his study and help him fill in the blank crossword puzzles.  They provided the solution word. Then Dawe would  create the clues for their chosen words.

In the end, the British teenagers were getting the code words from Canadian and American soldiers who were billeted close to Dawe's school.

When the Dieppe Raid was over at 10:50 am that morning, 3,367 Canadians were dead, wounded or captured! The Canadians had landed on the beach only to be pinned down, and trapped on that beach by the high sea wall and the German machine guns.

The British suffered 934 dead, wounded, or captured.

The Germans were unimpressed with the raid.

General Conrad Haase described the Dieppe Raid as "incomprehensible".  How could a single division be expected to overrun a German regiment that was heavily fortified in its surroundings and supported in that position by heavy artillery.

  

The Churchill tanks although a new and fresh British design were "easy to fought", "poor and obsolete".

German Field Marshall Von Rundstedt noted the Allies would not have another Dieppe because "it has gained that experience dearly."

…and notably, from Wikipedia,

ALLIED ANAYSIS of the DIEPPE RAIDTHE LESSONS LEARNED AT DIEPPE essentially became the textbook of “what not to do” in future amphibious operations, and laid the framework for the Normandy landings two years later. 

Most notably, Dieppe highlighted:

1. the need for preliminary artillery support, including aerial bombardment;

2. the need for a sustained element of surprise;

3. the need for proper intelligence concerning enemy fortifications;

4. the avoidance of a direct frontal attack on a defended port city; and,

5. the need for proper re-embarkation craft.

As a consequence of the lessons learned at Dieppe, the British developed a whole range of specialist armoured vehicles which allowed their engineers to perform many of their tasks protected by armour, most famously Hobart's Funnies. The operation showed major deficiencies in RAF ground support techniques, and this led to the creation of a fully integrated Tactical Air Force to support major ground offensives.

Another effect of the raid was change in the Allies' previously held belief that seizure of a major port would be essential in the creation of a second front. Their revised view was that the amount of damage that would be done to a port by the necessary bombardment to take it, would almost certainly render it useless as a port afterwards. As a result, the decision was taken to construct prefabricated harbours, codenamed "Mulberry", and tow them to lightly defended beaches as part of a large-scale invasion.

WESTJET 737 DUELS with USAF P-51…at BIGGEST, BADDEST…

…and loses—

Hey, what did you think would be the outcome?!

USAF P-51 at "BIGGEST, BADDEST" (Hamilton Air Show, June 2012), instinctively swings around to protect the legendary bombers (B-29 Superfortress, Avro Lancaster, B-25 Mitchell and the B-17 Flying Fortress. WESTJET 737 instinctively stops advancing…

BIGGEST, BADDEST 2012…sees Chuckie Fly over HAMILTON…

…and although their won't be any NHL teams in Hamilton, anytime soon, at least the Canadian Warplane Heritage Museum keeps the city entertained!

MY iPhone 4S Captures ANOTHER SUSPICIOUS Brampton Farmhouse Fire…

HERE WE GO…yet another abandoned Brampton farmhouse…already sold to developers…mysteriously catches fire…in the middle of the night! 

For a hundred years the house sits blaze-free and then only a couple of years after it gets snapped up by a home building company…whoop, whoop…"FIRE!!!!!!!"

I saw it in the distance at 1:30 am and called it in.   

When I arrived at 1:37am…the Brampton Fire Department was already there.

I mean this was quite the blaze.  The nearest fire engine pumper (you can see it right beside the house) had been dousing the home with a steady stream of water for what seemed like an eternity…didn't even slow those arson-engineered flames down!

It costs some coin to raze an old farm home property.

It costs $40 of gas to pre-soak a farm-home's interior and 5 cents for the matches.

Basically…free.

Couldn't a land developer get a permit to do a controlled burn of these old properties?

Na.  Too risky in this case.  The city of B-Town would never approve it.  The proximity of other farmhouses and/or other residential, industrial properties poses too great a risk. You might end up with two blazes.

  

For instance, with this particular property located at approximately 10146 the Gore Road, Castlemore, there was a real concern amongst the firefighters about the residential property located just north of the blaze.  The sheer volume of smoke spewing thousands of live embers was certainly a sight to behold by me, AND not taken lightly, or as entertainment, by the Brampton Fire Department.  They stationed ready pumpers at the northern property, and one at the property just south of the 'fire'.  Several pumpers remained on "The Gore" to respond quickly to ANY changing conditions.

And conditions DID change.

I was engulfed in one such change and had to move (…and, I was more than 200 feet away!) as the smoke column flattened out, suddenly swung westward, and lowered so that I could look directly overhead and watch dancing embers sail by.  No wonder these firefighters are so concerned!  I moved moments later when I then felt the wall of intense heat that accompanied the fast-moving, jet-black billowing overhead.

One never has a proper camera…or a bag of marshmallows…at the oppertune moment.

Judging by the FD talkback on the pumper-truck PAs…the thick, black, billowing column of smoke laced with live embers that was over a half mile long…posed more of a concern to the northern property.

'Course, no one ever talks about the cost to scramble half the City of Brampton's Fire Department, the area police units, and the paramedic teams I saw perched, ready to respond further for what will be 10 hour stationing, or more, while the fire plays itself out.

Dire Straits sang a song that included the line, "Money for nothin' and chicks for free…"

What we have here in Brampton is our own lyrics that could be easily interjected into the legendary Dire Straits "Money For Nothing" song.

Here's one line from my adapted version,  "…Razed buildings and emergency support services for free…"

Razing or blazing…probably costs about the same, $20,000 - $30,000.

What's the difference then?

One the developer pays for…and one the City pays for.

And you wonder why your City of Brampton property taxes are double or triple what Torontonians pay for equivalently valued properties!

I can think of at least 10 unsolved Brampton area mystery fires…that…'just happened'. 

I'm not talking about any of the "Laidlaw Lane" fires that took down Laidlaw family farm barns.  We know who did that.  Farm-hand's son gone berserk. Case closed. Rather sadly I might add.

But what of these other fires.

Hey, anyone thought of calling Pam Douglas?

::: AIR CANADA FLIGHT 621: Crash Site Development

WELL, THERE YOU have it. Roads.  Right into the northern perimeter of the accident site.  

However, things are much better this time.  The former crash arena has been culled and the topsoil entombed in the park and memorial area of the development.  The July 5th, 1970 crash that started in Toronto with the very hard landing of an Air Canada DC-8, and the loss of its' Number 4 engine…ended here, in Brampton, only three minutes later.  All 109 passengers and crew lost their lives 42 years ago, today.

Unlike, every other visit to the 621 field in the past…I have not been able to find a single Air Canada Flight 621 crash fragment.  No DC-8 pieces.  No passenger artifacts.

And certainly no bone fragments in situ, praise God!

The profile of the field has changed.  Entirely.  Not just roads but the elevation…all to make way for the eventual Flight 621 Memorial Park and cemetery.  And, the surrounding houses.

I took the old way in.  Everybody had a good laugh about that.

"Paul,  you could have taken the road in", says Diarmuid Horgan, of Candevcon Developments who is overseeing the field's transition process.

Old habits are hard to break.   For the longest time, the way I entered…was the only way into the crash site.

I am quite happy with the outstanding progress that has been made in the field to date. Much thanks to Diarmuid and the existing landowners. The full unveiling of the Flight 621 Memorial Park and Cemetery should be next year, around July 5, 2013 provided the City of Brampton clears all the development permits in a timely manner (hint, hint).

And only two weeks ago I was there for a very special event.  To help out, in a very small way, with the filming of a movie that will involve a segment about Flight 621!

  

I can't say a whole lot about the film to be released in January of 2013, except that it will be a docu-drama involving Lucie Raymond (who tragically lost her father in that horrific Air Canada crash), as well as other people who have to cope with personal loss.  The film is being directed by multiple-award winning French-Canadian director, Carole Laganière, of the National Film Board of Canada.

From the left: Barbara Winckler (crash eyewitness), Lucie Raymond (daughter of Martial Raymond), and director, Carole Laganière (NFB Canada). 

Carole Laganière

Born in Montreal, Carole Laganière studied film in Brussels (INSAS, 1983-87). She stayed on in Belgium to make her first short, Jour de congé, which won a number of prizes on the festival circuit. Back in Quebec, she directed Aline, which won the Bayard d'Or for the best feature film at the 1992 Festival de Namur.

Following several successful forays into docudrama (Histoires de musées, 1996-97, Des mots voyageurs, 1999), Laganière directed La fiancée de la vie (The Fiancée of Life), which won the Gold Award for Best Canadian Documentary at the 2002 Toronto Hot Docs Festival. She returned the next year with Un toit, un violon, la lune (The Moon and the Violin), which won the Gold Award again, this time in the short to mid-length category. She then directed Vues de l'Est (East End Kids), a documentary about children in Montreal's Hochelaga-Maisonneuve borough, followed by Country (2005), a documentary about the world of country and western festivals, co-produced at the NFB. May 2011 saw the release of her documentary L'Est pour toujours (East End Forever), a follow-up that examines the lives of the same children, now teenagers. Carole is named cinéaste en résidence at the NFB in Spring 2011.

CT-133 ACCIDENT day before, BIGGEST, BADDEST, AIR SHOW of 2012…

…as one of JAM's (Jet Aircraft Museum) 6 Silver Stars has port side landing gear ripped off upon landing.

The 'press' called it an incident, BUT it was an accident.

WHY?

Well, because it sorta' landed HARD…100 feet or so…short of the runway, folks!  On rough terrain, not ideal, and smooth runway tarmac.

Short of the runway!  That's key!!

Shooting Stars or Silver Stars NEVER HAD tundra tires!

Likely the pilot discovered he was underpowered on the approach, tried immediately to compensate by spooling up the RR Nene 10 Turbojet…but this…or any other ancient 1950-60s jet engine just can't respond that quickly, folks…so…wham (a hard touchdown hit), port-side landing gear gets imbedded in the ground(!) while the rest of the aircraft slides 2000' before it stops.

Thankfully, pilot and passenger emerged uninjured from the crash.

C-FUPM, formerly 133346 of the RCAF, will never fly again~

Which is sad.  I love JAM and their CT-133s, and most especially their Mako Shark!

Canadair CT-133 Canadian Shooting Stars are almost identical to American Lockheed T-33 Shooting Stars, because they were developed from them!  Canadian licence-built CT-133 HOWEVER are powered by Rolls-Royce Nene 10 Turbojets, while American T-33's were powered by Allison J33s.
 
Canadair of Montreal built 656 of these T-33 variants, or 10% of all T-33s made!   Most of those served with the RCAF.  Some CT-133s still fly active-duty with the Bolivian Air Force, while many others have a new home with civilians, who hobby fly them.

A majority of electronic components for this aircraft, and the very engine itself (Orenda-built) were made by Toronto defence contractors.

Looks like WESTJET Maintenance is working with JAM on this one—

The BIGGEST, BADDEST, AIR SHOW of 2012…anywhere…is happening THIS FATHER'S DAY WEEKEND in Hamilton!

TO CELEBRATE THE 40th Anniversary of the Canadian Warplane Heritage Museum, the museum is hosting the Hamilton Air Show this June 16 and 17 at 7825 Airport Rd. E. in Hamilton/Mount Hope , an air show…like no other!


There won't be another air show like this in Ontario, Canada for another 20 years!! 


IF, ever!


————————————————————————


Here's the spectacular, star-studded line-up:


* HAMILTON SPORT PARACHUTE CLUB - Beech 18


* CANADIAN WARPLANE HERITAGE MUSEUM Mass Formation - Lancaster, Firefly & B-25, DC-3 & PBY, Beech 18 & Lysanders, Stearman, Chipmunk, Cornell, Tiger Moth, Fort & Finch


* GREAT WAR FLYING MUSEUM - World War I dogfight - Fokker DR.1, Sopwith 1 1/2 Strutter, Royal Aircraft Factory SE5A


* VINTAGE WINGS of CANADA - Goodyear FG-1D Corsair, Supermarine Spitfire MK. XVI, Hawker Hurricane Mk. IV, Canadair CL-13 Sabre "Golden Hawks" (Hawk One), Curtiss P-40 Kittyhawk, North American P-51D Mustang and the Westland Lysander MK. IIIA


* HARVARDS - Mass Formation & Aerobatic Team Demonstration


* CP-140 AURORA - demo performance


* FOCKE-WOLFE 190 (WWII German fighter) - Never before seen at a Canadian air show!


* NORTH AMERICAN P-51 Mustang


* GM FM-2 WILDCAT (US Navy)


* DOUGLAS AD-4 SKYRAIDER (Korean War, and Vietnam) (US Navy)


* MATT YOUNKIN - Beech 18 Aerobatics


* CF-18 HORNET DEMO


* PETE MCCLEOD - Red Bull Aerobatics


* The SNOWBIRDS 


* WORLD WAR II BOMBERS - B-29, B-17, B-25, Lancaster, Curtis-Wright Helldiver, B-24 Liberator (cancelled, crash landing a week ago), Grumman TBM Avenger (US Navy)


* FAIRCHILD REPUBLIC A-10 THUNDERBOLT IIs (2 -static)


Nope, the Province of ONTARIO will not see an air show like this…maybe…never again!  


Come out, and join the Canadian Warplane Museum's 40th Anniversary Celebration!


What am I exited about?


Well all the participating a/c of course, but I've never seen a B-29 Superfortress before, or a Focke-Wolfe 190.  


B-29s were the high-altitude pressurized bombers employed to drop the war-stopping A-Bombs on Japan.  Could Lancs have carried the hefty A-Bomb?  Yes. But NOT at the 32,000' feet height the B-29 could fly at!


The Focke-Wolfe 190 was a formidable foe for the legendary Spitfire and new, better Spitfires had to be developed…to counter-act this deadly German fighter.


Oh, and I can't get enough of the Hawk One Sabre in Golden Hawks colours!  And the Lysanders, and the Lancaster, and the B-17, and the A-10 tank-destroyers, and the…


SEE:  www.hamiltonairshow.com/performing-and-display-aircraft.aspx


(B-29 photo courtesy of (? Unknown), © CWH 2012…compiled graphic)

::: CRASHED and Found! P-40!! 70 Years Later!!!

CANADIAN WW II ACE, "Stocky Edwards" predesessorly marked aircraft…flown first by an RAF pilot has just been found, last month (March 2012), 70 years later, in the North African desert of Al Wadi al Jadid. 

Remarkably intact, the fighter-plane came down "power on" (the propeller is seen in the foreground, blades bent backward) back in 1942.  Right now little is known of the RAF airman who crash landed the Kittyhawk seven decades ago.

Presently, Vintage Wings of Canada flies a P-40 painted up in Stocky's desert campaign colours, in honour of Canada's wartime hero.  Stocky's Kittyhawk "K" version aircraft with the "B   H S" marking replaced the downed in the desert Kittyhawk "D" version aircraft seen in the recent crash photo.

Born in Nokomis, Saskatchewan, James Francis "Stocky" Edwards, CM, DFC & Bar, DFM, CD was Canada's highest scoring ace in the Western Desert Campaign of WW II.  

Edwards took out the famed German ace Otto Schultz (51 kills) on June 17, 1942.

Stocky is 91 years young…and lives in Comox, BC with his wife Toni.

Thanks to Vintage Wings of Canada who recently posted this Kittyhawk news!

I'm giving a shout-out to Dave O'Malley…of VWofC, who brought this story to my attention!

That guy is amazin'!!

See his Kittyhawk HS-B article here:

www.vintagewings.ca/VintageNews/Stories/tabid/116/article...

Read ALL of DAVE'S fantastic articles, rife with splendid photography and interesting info, HERE:

www.vintagewings.ca/VintageNews/tabid/72/language/en-CA/D...

This crashed P-40 was manufactured in Buffalo, NY.

53 YEARS AGO TODAY…the Arrow is cancelled…and CANADA returns to Research and Development Obscurity

IN 1959, CANADA WAS on top of the world with aircraft interceptor and jet engine programmes so advanced that the Avro Arrow introduces almost 30 aviation firsts. Simultaneously, the Orenda Iroquois is also on stage, set to be licence-built by Curtis-Wright Inc. of America for a production run of 12,000 jet engines!

In spite of these incredible technological achievements, the Prime Minister of Canada, J.G. Diefenbaker, cancels both cutting edge projects and squanders Canada's chance to retain its technological lead.

Canada would never recover.

The CF-105 Avro Arrow Interceptor program, and the PS-13 Orenda Iroquois Engine program, become the last time CANADA reaches 'for the stars' and contributes seriously to military technological advancement as a NATO member nation.

Awesome photo courtesy of Marc-Andre Valiquette's Destruction of a Dream Volume 3! If you don't have Marc-Andre's four volume series about Avro Canada and the Avro Arrow…what…are you waiting for?!