‘Flight safety incident’ led to Snowbirds cancellation
A spokesperson for the Royal Canadian Air Force says he can’t get into specific details but has confirmed that a performance error during a Snowbirds airshow in Florida on May 6 is a more-specific reason behind why the iconic aerial team’s Fort Erie performance for next week was cancelled earlier this week.
A “flight safety incident” occurred during a show in Fort Lauderdale and is now being investigated internally, according to David Lavallee from the RCAF’s public affairs department.
He said the incident involved a “deviation from position” and is being reviewed by the RCAF’s flight safety system so identified mistakes can be corrected and lessons can be learned.
This wasn’t the first time an imperfection had been noticed recently, as Lavallee also said “it was an accumulation of these types of incidents” that resulted in the Snowbirds cancelling six upcoming scheduled shows in Canada and the U.S.
“The margin for error for these men and women is very, very small,” said Lavallee in a phone interview on Thursday afternoon.
Fort Erie’s show was set to take flight on May 24 and many members of the community were looking forward to seeing Capt. Paul Faulkner show his flying abilities to his hometown.
The cancellation was announced at Monday’s Fort Erie town council meeting before the Snowbirds released an official statement, saying the air show team had decided to undertake additional practice and training from its home base at 15 Wing Moose Jaw before returning to the 2017 scheduled air performance season.
“While we have had several wellexecuted shows and practices early in the season, our team lead has determined that additional training is required,” said the statement.
“A reduced training period hampered by poor weather which continued into the show season, resulted in numerous cancelled practices. As a result, more training is required before the Snowbirds resume the 2017 schedule,” said Maj. Patrick Gobeil, Snowbirds team lead.
“We have cancelled our participation in some upcoming air shows, and intend to return to the air show circuit once we have the consistency required for our dynamic nine-aircraft aerobatic performance,” it said in the statement released Monday night.
Tom Kuchyt, Fort Erie’s chief administrative officer, said he doesn’t expect the municipality to be on the hook for its half of the $15,000 cost of the show, which was to be split with the Fort Erie Economic Development and Tourism Corp.