SPACE - WHY CANADA MUST REGAIN ITS RIGHTFUL PLACE
With the launch of Alouette 1 back in September, 1962 Canada became only the third country in the world to put a satellite into space and that ultimately led to Canada taking a leading role in space technology where domestic companies like Telesat and MDA blazed new trails in areas like spacebased radar and satellite communications. Certainly, a country like Canada with its vast land mass, can benefit from these technologies that assist in bringing the country together. But, in recent years Canada has lagged the world in this field, however now a new initiative dubbed #DONTLETGOCANADA aims to raise awareness of Canadian accomplishments in space such as CanadaArm.
Certainly Canadian astronauts like Chris Hadfield, Roberta Bondar and the government’s own Marc Garneau (currently Minister of Transport) have been pioneers in space exploration. The current space-related global market opportunity is estimated to be $500 billion and it’s expected to grow substantially in the coming decades. Also, as CDR has reported recently, Canada’s military needs a new spacebased communications system to eliminate gaps in its network, so for all these reasons and more, we decided the time was right to take a detailed look at this industry with an in-depth Cover Story.
As you will learn from the feature report by James Careless in this issue, the current absence of a space policy – and substantial federal funding to support it – is of fundamental concern to Canada’s space and communications industry.
There are attractive opportunities out there, such as the ‘Lunar Gateway’ project, which would be a smaller version of the International Space Station, but without a government policy in place, Canadian industry may miss out.
Therefore, Canada needs to decide in the next few months if it’s going to sign up for that program and, as MDA’s Mike Greenley told James Careless for our report, Canada must leverage its established industrial base in order to participate in that program. For all the latest on Canada’s Space Industry, we urge you to read our Cover Story in this issue.
A FOND FAREWELL TO SEA KING
After 55 years of dedicated service the venerable CH-124 Sea King has now been retired as the new CH-148 Cyclone takes over as Canada’s premier sub hunter. By the way, the helicopter was originally assembled at United Aircraft (now Pratt & Whitney) in Longueil, Quebec way back in 1963. How often are we able to say that a military aircraft was actually built in this country these days?
Back in early December, CDR was invited to participate in a farewell ceremony that took place at 443 Maritime Helicopter Squadron in Pat Bay near Victoria, B.C. where the new Cyclone will be based.
As you will see from our pictorial tribute to Sea King in this issue, many dignitaries, including the Commander of the RCAF, LGen Al Meinzinger and Deputy Commander of the Royal Canadian Navy, RAdm Art McDonald, were on hand for the ceremony.
After 55 years of yeoman’s service that saw the helicopter travel many thousands of miles, working with the Iroquois-class, Protecteur-class and Halifax-class ships, it is fitting that the aircraft and those that operated and maintained it all those years be recognized, so as we bid farewell to the CH-124 Sea King, we say thank you – you are “cleared to fold”.
