Video Viewport

This area provides a window onto the world of internet video platforms – YouTube and Vimeo, for example – that host user-uploaded videos featuring Canadian aviation history content. The selections will change on occasion depending on interest (or not!) and site performance impact (so far, so good).

While you are here, we're looking for old found footage, including crown copyright material now in the public domain, or documentary productions that use historical aviation footage with either musical or narration.

If you are aware of any related videos already posted, or have videos to post, please get in touch. We might want to showcase them here. Feel free to contact the webmaster with details.

Perseverance: Some Reflections on 55 Years of the Canadian Sea King Helicopter

By The Vertical Flight Society
From their YouTube channel
A historical accounting of the 55-year career of the Sea King helicopter in Canadian service, as given by Colonel (Ret'd) John L. Orr, Shearwater Aviation Museum. This 30-minute historical documentary was first presented at the Vertical Flight Society’s 76th Annual Forum on Oct. 8, 2020, in conjunction with other introspective accountings of aviation and helicopter history. Abstract: "On August 1, 1963, the first two Canadian Sea King helicopters arrived at their new home station, Shearwater, Nova Scotia and joined the Royal Canadian Navy. On Saturday, December 1, 2018, three Canadian Sea King helicopters, now part of the Royal Canadian Air Force, made their final flight over their home station at Patricia Bay, British Columbia.

​This paper outlines some of the highlights of the intervening 55 years with particular emphasis on procurement and fleet introduction, the helicopter’s rapid change of roles from dedicated anti-submarine warfare helicopter to a general-purpose surveillance platform for the First Gulf War and finally, the truly amazing accomplishments of the Canadian Sea Kings in the year 2010. It is worth bearing in mind that although the personnel may have changed and the roles and equipment of the aircraft have been modified, the requirement to provide ‘Wings for the Fleet’ has remained constant over the years."

A Design Worthy of Success: Bernard Sznycer, Selma Gottlieb and the Intercity SG-VI

By The Vertical Flight Society
​From their Youtube Channel
This short historical documentary looks at the development of Intercity Airlines Company’s SG Mark VI by a unique team-based for a time in Montréal, Québec. Bernard W. Sznycer and Selma G. Gottlieb conceived one of the most advanced and innovative helicopters of its day.  Designed to minimize vibrations and facilitate production, the SG Mark VI first flew in July 1947. Canada’s Department of Transport awarded a Certificate of Airworthiness to a second prototype, in April 1951. The SG Mark VI was the first helicopter designed within the British Commonwealth of Nations to be so honored. 

This short historical documentary was first presented at the Vertical Flight Society’s 76th Annual Forum by Rénald Fortier, Curator, Aviation and Space Canada Aviation and Space Museum Ottawa, Ontario, Canada in conjunction with other introspective accountings of aviation and helicopter history.
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A copy of this historical paper may be downloaded from the Vertical Flight Society store.

A Day on an Aircraft Carrier

By CAHS Regina Chapter
From the CAHS Youtube Channel
CAHS Regina member Will Chabun shares his January 2019 visit to the USS Midway Museum in San Diego, California.

Operation Manna

By CAHS Ottawa Chapter
From their Youtube Channel
Operation Manna, and Operation Chowhound, were each a major humanitarian effort towards the end of World War 2 to supply food products to the impoverished and starving civilian population of German occupied Netherlands. Mathias Joost, Canadian Aviation Historical Society, Ottawa Chapter, has researched and presented here the contribution of the RCAF, RAF, and USSAF to these operations, on the 75th Anniversary of "OpManna and OpChowhound".

Avro Arrow: For The Record​

By CAHS Ottawa Chapter
From their Youtube Channel
Author, Researcher, and Writer Palmiro Campagna brings to light increasingly more researched data and declassified information on the Avro Arrow project, and uses it to debunk many of the conspiracy theories as to its demise, while at the same time presents other projects from AV Roe and Avro which helped to place Canada at the leading edge of aircraft technology in the 1950's.

Check out the other videos from CAHS Ottawa Chapter Here

CBC's Klahanie - "The Stranny"

Stu Phillips and Hugh Mann talk about their experiences flying the Supermarine Stranraer flying boat on the west coast of BC.

Klahanie, a Chinook word for "the great outdoors", was the title of a half-hour program on the wilderness and outdoor activities, with an accent on conservation. The object of the program was to take viewers to see some of the flora and fauna of some of the most beautiful and inaccessible parts of the world.

A Hurricane Comes Home – Videos

By John Chalmers
For the Calgary Mosquito Society
The first video is a must-see of the completion ceremony when the Hurricane was unveiled on November 6, with speakers Brian Desjardins, Calgary mayor Naheed Nenshi, pilot Gordon Hill and Richard de Boer.
The second video features comments by Byron Reynolds, Gordon Hill in flying the aircraft, history of the Mosquito Society and some footage of the Restoration Process.

>Click here to return to the original article.

Aviators of Hudson Strait

Produced by the
National Film Board of Canada (NFB)
Written and Produced by William Weitraub
Location cameraman, George H. Valliquette (Fox News)
As described by the NFB, this 28 minute, 1973 documentary:

"… looks at early Canadian aviation through film footage shot by the Royal Canadian Air Force and the recollections of retired Air Vice-Marshal [AVM] Thomas A. Lawrence, leader of the 1927-28 aerial survey expedition to Ungava Bay and Hudson Strait. The formidable challenge of flying under Arctic conditions, the hazards faced and the emergencies solved, often with the help of Inuit, make an absorbing chapter of northern frontier history."
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AVM Lawrence served as technical advisor and co-narrator for the film, and a 1973 interview with him also features in the film. 
Aviators of Hudson Strait – ​provided by the National Film Board of Canada

The Canadair CT-114 Tutor

By Brad Gordanier
Polyus Studios
A well made video on Canadiar's Tutor. Unusual in that it goes beyond the Snowbirds-only approach many videographers have taken on this particular subject
Do you have an abiding interest in the Canadair CL-41 / CT-114 Tutor? Check out Bill Upton's thoroughly-illustrated CAHS Journal series, now available as an instant-download CAHS Journal Compendium digital (PDF) publication, featuring high-resolution graphics and fully searchable text. If only one or two aspects of this aircraft's long history are of interest, then the individual articles that make up the series are also available as individual PDFs, or as part of the Journal issues they were originally published in, as either print or digital editions.

RCAF Sea Hurricanes – 1942

Edited by Avialogs
original footage  source unknown
Some wonderfully preserved colour footage of a formation of Sea Hurricanes. If anyone has additional information please get in touch. Avialogs is a purveyor of an interesting array of historic aviation technical documentation.