Great News for General Aviation in the Annapolis Valley

[Moose47]

G'day

Great news for general aviation in the Annapolis Valley. Check out page 3.

http://www.auroranewspaper.com/pdf/2016/3704news.pdf

Cheers...Chris

[Donald]

It is good news, but after training at Shearwater, I hope they provide better service to the civilians this time around.

[Moose47]

G'day Donald

What civilians would that be?

Cheers...Chris

[Donald]

Shearwater Flying Club, late '90's for me.

[toelessjoe]

I did my muti IFR back in the day at the Greenwood Flying Club. The military treated us excellently (is that a word? It's early...) The men and women of Canada's finest made up a significant number of our membership. I am beyond happy to hear this! I will definitely be hanging out!

Toeless.

[Moose47]

G'day Toeless

How long ago was that.

I started my multi-engine course while at Greenwood in 1976. It was an older model Apache with DME.

Cheers...Chris

[Donald]

Might've been the difference at Shearwater, the club there had no military members so I guess we were just an annoyance.

[toelessjoe]

I did my IFR at the gfc in 1995?6?. They had a beer fridge. It was a good beer fridge.

I was also there when Goldie won the 649. The look on his face was priceless. We all made use of said beer fridge that night.

Toeless.

[HiFlyChick]

Might've been the difference at Shearwater, the club there had no military members so I guess we were just an annoyance.

I was there in the late 80s, early 90s, and there were a few military members then - I always thought we got along quite well with the base. Was SFC still a club by the time you were there or had it switched over to being a for-profit school by then? I once inquired about a check-out after the change-over (but can't recall when that happened) and was saddened to discover how much money had become the driving factor. Back when it was "just" a club we had a lot of social activities and free safety seminars and the like, and the money was secondary - sure we needed to make ends meet, but the point was to promote GA and flight safety and enjoy the company of other pilots.

I still recall one particularly memorable fly-in - the only time I participated in a flour bombing contest. Our "bomb" was miles from the target, but my prescription sunglasses hit fairly close to home

[JAllen]

I always enjoyed my time at CYAW and was sad to see it close. My impression was that DW genuinely cared about general aviation and the students.

If I recall correctly a lot of the costs came from the military imposing high landing fees.

Great news to see things continuing in the valley, maybe some day we'll have an option closer to the city.

Happy flying,

JAllen

[Donald]

I was there in the for-profit days, right after the meltdown of CASA (formerly the Halifax Flying Club at YHZ).

As a civilian pilot, it seemed like the service level just wasn't there for the club. Maybe part of it stemmed from YAW being primarily a SeaKing base? In the winter it would take several days after any kind of snowfall to get more than a 10 foot wide path to the runway clear, the tower operated on no consistent basis which made it difficult to have runway lights available at night consistently, plus the military mindset meant efficiency wasn't required.

It was great they took us in after the debacle at CASA, and it's great that Greenwood is helping out the Waterville folks, hope it works out for the best.

[JasonE]

Hopefully will get to land there once before it closes....If weather permits I'm planning a flight out that way in March.