AIR TRAINING.

Auckland Star, Volume LXXI, Issue 14, 17 January 1940, Page 5

AIR TRAINING.

CANADA'S 'DROMES.

BUILT BY RELIEF LABOUR.

CHAIN ACROSS DOMINION.

OTTAWA, December 28.

The extensive system of the TransCanada Airways, with its numerous airfields, will be used as the nucleus of the inter-Empire air training scheme. In anticipation of the successful development of the scheme, extensive surveys have been conducted during the past two months in selecting airfields specially designed for this work when completed. Reconnaissance and survey parties have been in the field, headed by officials with long experience in this work. The selection of required additional airports has been practically completed, and during the winter months construction work on hangars, workshops and otker facilities will be undertaken. In addition, the Trans-Canada Airways have greatly expanded the facilities of their own airports. New airfields have been surveyed and additional radio beacons have been installed. "The foresight of those Canadians who planned some 12 years ago for the development of a Trans-Canada Airway brought rewards to this country with the approach of hostilities," stated a I Government speaker in a recent radio address. "They well realised that the creation of such an artery would prove of material importance in the defence! of Canada, should an emergency arise. They saw the day when aircraft, personnel and equipment would be transferred with great rapidity from one part of the country to another. Such has now been done in the present emergency. "The economic depression from which Canada, with other countries, suffered in 1932 was responsible for the establishment of unemployment relief camps. I The men there engaged in the creation ,of aerodromes extending from coast to Icoast now have the satisfaction of that their individual efforts

greatly contributed to the present welfare of the Dominion. Perhaps they are now in the Air Force and using the landing fields they or some of their number helped to build. Carved in some cases from virgin forest, and in others laid on the site of an extensive marsh, these aerodromes formed the foundation of the air service now being maintained between Vancouver and Moncton. This service is invaluable to so vast a country in time of war." While the production of aircraft in Canada has been greatly accelerated, numbers of 'planes have been purchased from the United States. Provisions in the United States neutrality law do not permit of aircraft to be used for war purposes being flown across the frontier, so adjoining landing fields have been, built at different places along the Canadian-United States boundary and the machines are towed across. An instance of this wae recently reported from a border post in the Canadian mid-west. In the words of an observer, "no aerodrome actually straddles the border at this point, but landing fields have been created on either side and linked with a straight road of some 800 yards. There is a slight decline from the American to the Canadian field, which facilitates the towmg procedure. As no officers or airmen of the Royal Canadian Air Force may cross the international line without running the risk of being interned, a tow rope was thrown across the frontier, attached to the American-built air£f aft ' and then drawn back into Canada.