From Dunleer to Canada, Terry rules the sky
A Dunleer native who flew his mid-Louth coop over 60 years ago has been making headlines in his adopted home in Canada.
81-year-old Terry McConnon recently sold Canada’s oldest commercial flight school, Laurentide Aviation in Les Cèdres, which he had owned for over two decades.
With a current fleet of seven Cessnas and two Grummans available for lessons, a stateof-of-art mechanical services department for pilots who have already earned their wings, and year-round facilities for private aircraft owners, the school - which was founded in 1946 by Jack Scholefield - has since graduated over 15,000 students, many of whom have gone on to fly with Air Canada and other major international carriers.
For Terry, who immigrated to Canada when he was 18 and has been flying for as long as he can remember, it has been a week of mixed emotions.
“Aviation has been my life,” he told his local Hudson paper The Journal in an interview last month. “It has been good to me. And owning this school and seeing so many new pilots, men and women, take to the skies has been a dream come true.”
Terry is from a well-known family in Dunleer, and his proud friends Tess Connolly and Harley Cunningham from his hometown have followed his progress for decades and contacted the Drogheda Independent with the story.
“I remember him from school, although he was a good few years ahead of me,” says Tess with a cheeky smile, “and although I don’t ever recall him having a major interest in flying back then, he did always want to travel.
“Still, we know he still has a great fondness for his hometown, and we’d all love to see him settle back here at some stage.”
Flying did become his passion though, and Terry has been a commercial and bush pilot in the Arctic, as well as a former RCAF Major retired pilot with 23 years in the service.
“But there comes a time when age inevitably catches up with you and you realise that you just don’t want to have the constant pressure anymore,” he told The Journal’s James Parry.
“And so, I’m passing on the torch to people who really share my love of aviation and know what the business is all about.”
One of his most memorable experiences without a doubt was when he was serving with the 401 Squadron in Westmount in the 1960s and received a written invitation from the US Government office in Plattsburgh offering him paid helicopter training with a promotion in Florida.
“The next thing I know I’m being shipped to Saigon piloting Forward Air Controller Cessna Bird Dog observation aircraft and Bell helicopters over Vietnam. Heck, to be perfectly honest, before that I didn’t even know there was a war going on over there,” he told The Journal.
His adventures continued, after he returned to Canada nine months later.
“There was a bit of a schmozzle one day, not sure what happened, but as we were flying over the countryside, I suddenly felt an impact and was frothing at the mouth and coughing up blood. Turns out I had a collapsed lung and a piece of metal in my back. And that was the end of my little Vietnam adventure!”
But Terry couldn’t quite get his head out of the clouds, and before he eventually took charge, was an instructor with Laurentide Aviation sharing his knowledge and expertise with students aged from 15 to over 50.
He still has a valid Commercial Pilot license and hopes to become the oldest commercial pilot in Canada. His friends and family here hope he eventually points the plane in Dunleer’s direction, even for a flying visit.