[Milsurplus] knots and The Gimli Glider

[D C *Mac* Macdonald]

If I recall correctly, the pilot had been stationed
there whilst he was in the RCAF.  I have the whole
story filed somewhere.  Pretty fantastic.

Mac - K2GKK/5




----Original Message Follows----
From: "John Page" <k4kwm at hotmail.com>
To: kgordon2006 at verizon.net, Milsurplus at mailman.qth.net
CC: glowbugs at piobaire.mines.uidaho.edu
Subject: Re: [Milsurplus] knots and The Gimli Glider
Date: Fri, 17 Mar 2006 00:46:25 +0000

I believe there was a movie made about this. I remember the drag race part 
with the plane landing

John Page K4KWM
Hollow State since 1953
(ex W8PKU,N8BLB,NA8O)



>
>OK. The Gimli Glider was, I believe, an Air Canada jet liner. I don't
>remember the exact model, but I believe it had twin fan-jets, one under
>each wing.
>
>In any case, it was late taking off because Canada had just mandated
>changing everything from English to Metric measurements. At one time
>there were some six people in the cockpit all trying to make the
>conversion from Imperial gallons to Liters to figure out how much fuel
>they should carry.
>
>Finally, they supposedly had it all figured out, loaded the fuel, and
>took off from some Eastern seaboard city to fly to, IIRC, Vancouver.
>B.C. on the west coast.  They had a full load of passengers. Again,
>IIRC, about 200.
>
>Somewhere over Alberta, they suddenly ran completely out of fuel.
>They were at altitude, and had SOME time, but not much. They
>frantically radioed for someplace, ANYplace to land. Turns out the
>nearest airfield that could possibly take them was an abandoned one
>at, IIRC, Gimli, BC. The airfield was routinely used as a drag strip.
>
>When they arrived over the airfield a race was in progress. The pilot
>had recently had some time in REAL gliders, and managed to side slip
>the plane in to land it, passing silently over two kids on bicycles
>who were racing down the runway, and missing EVERYthing and
>everyone on the ground.
>
>They could not get the nose-wheel down, so landed it on its nose.
>Lotsa sparks, lotsa noise, no fire.
>
>Everyone and everything was safe.
>
>Later, Air Canada took a fuel truck out to the airfield, lifted the
>nose and cranked the nose-wheel down, took off and flew it somewhere
>for maintenance. The last time I talked with an Air Canada pilot (or
>whatever airline it was in) that plane was still in the fleet,
>although it is probably retired by now.
>
>The story was written up in Readers Digest a number of years ago, and
>is one of my favorites.
>
>Ken Gordon W7EKB