Tag Archives: Abbotsford

Conair Q400 Water Drop Testing

I went to Abbotsford for the day to see the arrivals of the planes for an event on the airport that weekend.  Abbotsford is also home to Conair with them undertaking conversion of aircraft for firefighting duties as well as maintaining their in service fleet.  They have a fleet of de Havilland Canada DHC8-400s that have been converted to waterbombing duties for fighting wildfires.  One of them was undertaking some test flying while I was there.

It took off while I was waiting for some other arrivals and then started undertaking a series of water drops at the far end of the field.  I did try getting some shots of it, but it was far away, and the heat haze was brutal, so this was not going to be a good result.  After eight drops, they landed and taxied back to the ramp.  Fortunately, later in the afternoon, they came back out for some more runs.  This time, since I was about to leave anyway, I headed to the other end of the field to get some shots of the test drops. 

Unfortunately, the weather became rather damp, and I was standing out trying to get some shots without getting drenched.  Seeing something like this without being in a dangerous spot where real fires are raging was a nice bonus.  I did also try a little video while I was at it so that is lower down too.

Calibrating the Drones Perhaps?

During the Abbotsford Air Show, we could see a bunch of people out on the airfield.  It wasn’t obvious what they were doing but I took some shots with the longest lens I had to see if I might later work out what was going in.  My friend Mark thought it might be related to the drone display that was due to take place after dark.  I think he might have been right.  Looking at the shots, they seem to be waving the drones around above themselves.  Maybe this is part of a calibration routine or something to do with activating them and having them communicate.  I don’t know.  If anyone is familiar with all of this, please do let me know in the comments.

My First Polaris – Just In Time

The Royal Canadian Air Force will soon be getting new tanker transport aircraft.  They are going to buy some Airbus A330 MRTTs to replace their CC-150 Polaris jets.  These are based on the A310 and I have never seen one before.  Fortunately, there was one on static display at Abbotsford for the air show.  It was in the grey scheme rather than the brightly painted version but that was fine by me.  I was just glad to get one before they are replaced.  It would be good to see one flying but I suspect the chances of that are diminishing.  You never know, though.

Parachute Smoke Trail Patterns

The Canadian Forces SkyHawks parachute display team opened the Abbotsford Air Show evening display.  One of the jumpers had a line of smoke canisters that hung beneath them as they descended under their canopy.  Some tight turns allowed the line to swing out and create some nice smoke trail patterns.  Here are some shots of the results.

Sunset on Mt Baker

I made a quick excursion across the border to Abbotsford for the air show.  I went for the evening show on the Friday rather than the day show.  The conditions were really nice for most of the show with the cloud rolling in only near the end of the proceedings.  Mt Baker is in the background across the border and provides a nice backdrop for some of the flying.  As the light got nicer, I wasn’t going to miss out on a couple of shots of the mountain with its cloud formations above the summit.