Flying On Instinct by L. D. Cross Page A

wingspan and capable of seating up to 11 people, the Otter easily landed entire sheets of plywood and 16-foot (5-metre) lengths of lumber. One builder noted that you could tell which cabins had been built after the Otter was in service because their roofing consisted of whole sheets of plywood instead of sawn lengths that had to be pieced together. More planes, more work and more money followed.
    By May 1953, Wardair Ltd. was in business, first operating domestically and then expanding into overseas charters. The airline had some unique assignments in the early years. On one occasion, a Texas rancher wanted a musk ox to crossbreed with his cattle, so two Wardair planes located a herd on the tundra and separated a young specimen from the rest. After one plane landed, its flying cowboys roped the wild creature, tied its legs and stowed it in the cargo area. They neglected to sedate it. For Ward, who still pitched in to clean and maintain his planes, this was the ultimate messy job.
    Ward took his company public in 1961 but retained controlling interest. By the mid-1970s, Wardair was Canada’s third-largest commercial airline and largest international air charter carrier, but the company faced tough competitionfrom Air Canada and CP Air as well as difficulties with government regulators. In 1989, Ward surprised Bay Street by selling his airline. It was yet another step in the familiar process of growing an airline by buying out the competition. In 1987, Pacific Western Airlines Corporation had purchased CP Air, which had already acquired Nordair and Eastern Provincial Airways. These four airlines were combined into Canadian Airlines International, which was further expanded with the purchase of Wardair but eventually taken over by Air Canada in 2000.
    Having received many aviation and business awards, Ward was inducted into Canada’s Aviation Hall of Fame in 1974. At the time, it was noted that “his lengthy and continuing efforts to responsibly service this nation’s most northern frontier by air, despite adversity, together with his development of a viable international charter service, have been of outstanding benefit to Canadian aviation.” The following year he was made an Officer of the Order of Canada.
    As Max Ward discovered, flying in the North was a dangerous proposition, and it remains so today. In wild, unforgiving country, bush pilots are at the mercy of unforeseen circumstances. They live or die by their endurance and skill. But thanks to his skill and determination, Ward’s one-man shoestring operation in the North grew into a multi-million-dollar charter operation that circled the globe.

CHAPTER
    8
Tales from
Mountain Valleys
    WHILE THE ENGINEER DID MOST of the drudge work to keep bush planes flying, it was usually the pilot who scooped up most of the glory. When their names and exploits appeared in newspapers, the recognition got them more flying contracts. Francis Russell “Russ” Baker used the press with great success, growing a single-plane operation into Central BC Airways. Stories about his derring-do and pioneering flights into unexplored territory appeared regularly in BC papers. Baker flew through difficult mountainous terrain with prospectors and also conducted mercy flights, arriving just in time to rescue lost trekkers. Forestry wardens were flown on patrols over hundreds of miles to otherwise inaccessible areas by “veteran bush pilot Russ Baker.”
    Baker’s reputation also brought him work from the Americans during the Second World War. Shortly after the US entered the war, following the December 7, 1941, Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, came the military initiative to build a highway from western Canada to Alaska so Allied troops could be rapidly deployed north if the Japanese invaded North America. Baker was one of several bush pilots contracted to fly surveyors along the proposed route. He did that and a lot more. On January 5, 1942, 14 new Martin B-26