In the cockpit of the helicopter Flying Officer Carl Bond of Edmonton turned to a man wearing an Indian sweater and asked, “How was that?”
“Good enough for a beginner,” grinned Bill McLeod . . . McLeod is an instructor with the remarkable company that’s running the schoolroom, Vancouver’s Okanagan Helicopters, the world’s largest commercial operator of helicopters.
The course began in September and ends in mid-April. At Ladner, using four plastic bubbled Bells and the odd Sikorsky, the air force flyers practice [sic] hovering, sideways flight [and] dike landing. At Penticton they learn to drop their large Sikorskys on mountain peaks the size of a double bed . . . The RCAF-Okanagan training contract is officially recognized as one of flying’s most whirlwind success stories . . . Today the company that [Carl] Agar launched in the Okanagan on a frayed shoestring . . . has flown more than 15,000 hours, carried more than 20,000 passengers [and] moved more than 2 million pounds of freight . . .
“I believe a man has to gamble security,” said Agar in a recent interview. “If his dream is big enough, then security is what he makes it. This country, Canada . . . and all that sky that’s up above . . . why, a man’s future is unlimited.”
Bolstered today by some of the continent’s shrewdest financial brains, Agar says of helicopters: “They have brought in an era of their own. With helicopters, every square foot of the earth’s land or sea surface is now conveniently approachable.”36
The Mountain Flying School alternated between civilian and Canadian military intakes at that time, although that year they also trained 22 pilots from US Army Transportation Helicopter Battalion and received a visit from a French armed forces colonel. However, the school was not popular with people living nearby who complained that they had to have bedroom and bathroom blinds because the helicopters cruised too low and too slowly.
The year 1955 ended with Okanagan placing an order for an S-58, making it the first commercial operator outside the United States to purchase the 12-passenger aircraft. Glenn McPherson, Okanagan’s president, told Sikorsky News:
The purchase of this type of aircraft is the beginning of a new expansion program at Okanagan . . . More of the big Sikorskys will soon be on order, but first we have to train our crews and maintenance personnel in the operation of this particular aircraft . . . The increased carrying capacity of the S-58—more than twice that of the S-55—is expected to substantially reduce the cost per ton mile for Okanagan’s freighting operations.37
1956
The new year began with a Pacific Western Airlines (PWA) contract to recover a de Havilland Beaver that had crashed on Sovereign Lakes, east of Quesnel, BC. Okanagan sent S-55 CF-GHV with a crew consisting of pilots Bill McLeod and Fred Eilertson and engineers Alf Stringer and Frank Ranger. When they arrived at the site, the crew found the area unsafe to land due to thawing caused by warmer than normal temperatures, but the Beaver was eventually slung out after a temporary site was set up and PWA engineers had prepared the aircraft for the lift.
Contracts in the summer of 1956 included a stratographic survey in the Jasper-Banff area for Imperial Oil and a geological survey at Dease Lake, BC, for the Department of Mines and Surveys. The company also transported crews to the BC-Yukon border for North West Power and carried equipment and supplies for Canadian Nickel in Manitoba. Okanagan’s helicopters also returned to the Kitimat area for a steel line construction contract. In the meantime a number of contracts, such as that for the Trans Mountain Pipeline patrol, were ongoing; by 1956 Okanagan had flown 355 patrols over 1,200 hours in 380 days.
In September, Boyles Brothers Drilling contacted Okanagan about moving a complete diamond drilling camp to a site on Takomkane Mountain (known as Timothy Mountain by the locals) in the Forest Grove area near 100 Mile House in central BC. Pilot Bud Tillotson and engineer Ian Duncan flew the Bell 47 CF-HDP to a rancher’s field east of Forest Grove, but during a flight over the site, Bud realized that the mine was located in a very steep ravine, which, due to prevailing westerly winds, caused a formidable downdraft. After talking it over with Art Hall, the geologist in charge, it was agreed that the helicopters would airlift the freight to a meadow with clear approaches at the 6,800-foot (2,072-metre) level, and a pack train would move the equipment from there to the site.
Their mountain flying training helped the crew face the greatest challenge at the site—taking off in circular winds. By flying at a 23-degree climb and holding to a speed of 50 mph (80 km/h), they were able to reach the base of the mountain and then, with a healthy updraft, the machine could reach the 7,000-foot (2,135-metre) level without difficulty. Within a week they had made 41 trips and moved 7.5 tons (6.8 metric tonnes) of equipment, averaging about 45 minutes per trip.
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On October 22 Bell 47 CF-FJA, pilot Bill Calder and engineer Mark Adams were called on to join the search for Harvey Garrison, an 18-year-old high school student from Princeton, BC, who had become lost while hunting with a friend near Granite Creek, about 18 miles (30 kilometres) from Princeton. The boy’s father had gone into the area with a search party and located his son’s tracks but lost them again in the dark. The next day a party of over 300 searched the area in adverse weather conditions. They picked up his tracks but realized that he was walking in large circles. Fires were lit in the area and a searchlight installed.
Okanagan was called on when the RCAF’s Piasecki was unable to join the search as it was undergoing maintenance. CF-FJA left Vancouver but bad weather prevented it from continuing beyond Hope. The next day they loaded the helicopter onto a flatbed truck and drove up to Sunday Summit where they were able to take off. Arriving in Princeton at 4:30 PM, they made a low sweep over the area, but in the gathering darkness they could only make out the fires below. The aerial search continued until the following Monday, but the boy was never found.
On the East Coast, Okanagan’s new acquisition, Canadian Helicopters, had secured a contract for an S-55 to take personnel to various Newfoundland fish processing plants. The province also chartered a helicopter to operate as an air ambulance, providing emergency services for people living in the isolated and scattered coves around the 900-mile (1,450-kilometre) coastline. When the formation of ice stopped water transportation between Belle Isle and the Newfoundland mainland, the helicopter was also used to lift passengers and freight across the straits. These contracts would last for the next five years.
▲ In 1956, Okanagan Helicopters’ subsidiary, Canadian Helicopters Ltd. won a five-year contract with the Newfoundland Fisheries Department for two S-55s. Pictured here is one of the S-55s. Photo courtesy of the Royal BC Museum and Archives, Fonds PR-1842
In Labrador, the company’s first S-58, CF-JIB, started work on the eastern end of the Mid-Canada Line, and on October 16 Sikorsky News announced that:
An S-58 helicopter delivered to Okanagan Helicopters Ltd. of Canada was put into operation last month carrying freight to radar installations in the Mid-Canada Line.
The aircraft was one of the first delivered when CAA approval was granted for its use in commercial service. Its receipt by Okanagan brings to 33 the total number of helicopters operated by the firm.
Flight delivery from Sikorsky Aircraft was made by Okanagan’s chief pilot, Fred Snell. Fitted out as a cargo transport, the helicopter will carry the majority of its loads externally by slinging beneath the cabin.38
During the autumn of 1956 pilot John McNulty and engineer Peter Berendt went missing for 11 days in the Great Slave Lake area of the Northwest Territories after their Bell 47 ran low on fuel and they were forced to land. The search for them covered a large area and involved many of their bush pilot friends from Yellowknife. As hope began to fade, the searchers decided they had been looking in the wrong area and headed out again in a Norseman to look at the second of two very similar bays. John’s son, Mike McNulty, recalled the rescue:
Before