Newsletter Archive/Archives du bulletin

webstertrophy.ca Newsletter #002 - 2014

Good Day Everyone.

Thank You Articles: Every year at the conclusion of the competition I have the great pleasure and honour to thank our growing list of supporters and especially those representatives who have done so much to have their companies and organizations join the programme. Whenever possible we wish to show our gratitude by assisting our supporters in any manner we can such as the project we are currently involved with at Nav Canada for example and ensuring that all logos are on our website and in our power-point presentations which are sent out to every Flight Training Unit (FTU) across the country.

Our latest thank you article is already up on the WINGS website and likely to show up soon on the other av trades as well. A full printed article along with pictures will be in an upcoming issue of COPA Flight. COPA Flight always gives us excellent exposure throughout the year.

Newest Supporter: A surprise announcement was made at the Awards Banquet when the winner Takashi Hirose was informed in front of all those in attendance that he would be able to have a future job with Air Georgian. As Brampton Flight Centre (BFC)is linked up in a programme with Air Georgian and also offers the winner a job should they get their instructor rating, the two positions are linked. The winner must work with BFC for a minimum of four months and subsequently will be endorsed to move onward. Once the winner achieves the minimum of 1,500 hours the position becomes available. On behalf of the entire Webster Team we would like to thank Air Georgian for this generous offer and involvement in the Webster programme.

In Webster update 7A it was announced that our sponsor Air Canada was offering all nine finalists guaranteed job interviews once they were qualified. Moncton Flight College is also giving each financial grants toward an instructor course with them. The Air Canada Pilots Association and Collegiate Aviation Canada give the winner financial assistance toward their further training. These incentives which have become recent realities allow those Webster finalists wishing to enter commercial operations tremendous advantages as they move forward in their quests and also I believe indicates the tremendous confidence all the supporters have in the promotion of Webster and general aviation in Canada. To all our supporters old and new, your names will be in the latest article but this is a personal thank you from the entire team.

2014 has started already. We have just completed a two day display at the annual Vintage Wings Airshow in Gatineau, Que. which was very successful. With a display set up in the main hangar we of course are deluged with the general public but we do manage to capture the interest of pilots as well and interest a number to compete. It is also a small way of supporting Vintage Wings for their support of us. That is a great show loaded with WW2, classic and modern aircraft and well worth seeing. At the end of the month we are off to Toronto to visit Air Canada, attend the Northern Lights banquet in honour of our 1952 competitor Felicity McKendry and Snowbirds retiring commanding Officer L/Col. Maryse Carmichael. While there, we hope to do a Webster presentation at BFC and also visit with our 2014 host, Waterloo-Wellington Flight Centre to begin preliminaries for next August.

Curtiss Rambler. While attending the Vintage Wings Air Show I was approached by a gentleman associated with the Montreal Aviation Historical Association who informed me that they were in the processed of restoring a Curtiss Rambler.

This was the type flown by John C Webster in the 1931 air race in Britain and depicted in Bob Bradford's beautiful painting. This was extremely exciting news. I do not know what stage it is at yet and what the proposed completion date is but when it is airborne we will do our utmost to have it on hand at the competition.

John Webster would be so proud. Back in his day contact was made through snail mail, air mail and telegraph and that was pretty much it. Nowadays of course we are technologically advanced and Webster like everyone else has been using computers (not always very well) and websites for years now. What we haven't been doing however is establishing contact with our finalists, competitors and interested parties through social media. That has finally changed through the time and efforts of out 2013 runner-up Stuart Loney who has set up a Webster site on Facebook for us. It is hoped that this will be come the prime venue for contact between the alumni especially as they can now easily review what others are doing and make contact. Thank you Stuart. This was needed. The link is: https://www.facebook.com/webstertrophy

Wayne

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