Episode 37: The Veteran: Remembrance Day and a Career to Remember Part 2 - Duncan

What was it like to fly the legendary CP-121 Tracker, or the mighty CP-140 Aurora when it was a new aircraft? Duncan MacIsaac served for 27 years in the Regular Force and another 8 in the Reserves. He has flown many aircraft types in the RCAF, and has a ton of experience to share. Part 2 of our 2 part Remembrance Day episode will feature Duncan's time instructing on Sea Kings, flying the Tracker, and flying the Aurora. We'll also chat about his transition to civilian life, his work with the legion, and his work supporting the veteran community.

Episode Transcript

Bryan (00:29):
Alright. We're ready for departure here at the pilot
project podcast, the best sourcefor stories and advice from the
pilots of the RCAF. I'm yourhost, Brian Morrison, and we are
here today for part 2 of ourdiscussion with Duncan MacIsaac.
Today, we'll be hearing abouthis time instructing on Sea
Kings, flying the tracker,flying the Aurora, and
transitioning to civilian life,including his involvement with

(00:50):
the veteran community. Withoutfurther ado, here we go into
part 2 of our chat with Duncan.
So after a time you transitionedto training other Sea King
pilots at 406 MaritimeOperational Training Squadron,
how did this experience differfrom operations?

Duncan (01:04):
Well, the big thing was, of course, you, didn't have to.
We need appointments aboardship. You would take them out
sometimes. I knew a littletraining with, what we called
DDLs, your star deck landing,and, basically teach them how to
land on the aircraft or, or onthe ship. But we got a big a big

(01:27):
difference was you were homeovernight, basically.

Bryan (01:29):
What did that involve teaching them to land on the
ship?

Duncan (01:32):
Just getting them used to landing on a small area, and
I can talk a little bit up withthe bear trap if you'd like. Oh,
sure. The bear trap on the holddown system was, was very good,
and, some people think that the,hold down system just takes over
and and lands the aircraft. Itdoesn't. All it does is make
you, a little more stable, but,basically, you're you're

(01:54):
controlling the helicopter rightto the landing.

Bryan (01:57):
Can you explain what the bear trap is?

Duncan (01:58):
A bear trap is basically where you're allowing a cable
from the aircraft down to, thedock. Now they're hooking up a a
heavier cable from the ship,which now goes up inside the
helicopter and gets locked intowhat we call the probe. You
forward a probe from thehelicopter, which goes inside

(02:20):
the bear trap. And when you'velanded the helicopter, the bear,
the landing safety officer,who's in a hurry off to the side
of the flight deck, will closethe bear trap, and it basically,
at this point, you have, thehelicopter part of the deck.

Bryan (02:38):
Okay. And so it it basically locks it in place once
it's down?

Duncan (02:41):
Correct. Yeah.

Bryan (02:43):
And and so you were saying people think that the
bear trap sort of does it foryou, but that's not the case.

Duncan (02:48):
It is not the case. No. You can you can override, even
at maximum tension on the holdon cable, you can override that
with the clock.

Bryan (02:57):
And so what's it doing for you as you are still, like,
in the hover to land? What's thebear trap doing for you?

Duncan (03:04):
The bear trap is is making the, the helicopter more
stable. If you're landing atnight and it's a a fairly heavy
sea, the ship is moving aroundquite a bit. But no matter how
much a ship is rolling andpitching, there'll be a steady
period, and that is the job of alanding safety officer. He has
to determine exactly when thedeck is, steady, and he'll tell

(03:28):
the pilot to land. Land now.

Bryan (03:30):
And so you just basically, I don't know if this
is the right term, but youbasically thump it in at that
moment. It's time to bring itin?

Duncan (03:37):
Yes. You do. Yeah. But you don't wanna thump it too
hard. Yeah.
Otherwise, you, might might needa sponsor.

Bryan (03:44):
Yeah. That's fair. Yeah. And and I believe that the bear
trap is a Canadian invention,isn't it?

Duncan (03:50):
It is. And, I know when they when they first started
using it, other navies would,come and look at it and then
determine, if it was somethingthat they needed to have because
I think Canada was one of thefirst, countries to actually
land such a big helicopter on asmall ship.

Bryan (04:10):
That's pretty interesting.

Duncan (04:12):
There were 2 different kind of, ships at the time. A
class of, ship, with the Huron.There were 4 of them that, had 2
helicopters. So there were 2hangars, a little bit of a
larger flight deck, and, you had2 helicopters on. The other
ships I was on, Annapolis andSaginay, only had the one

(04:33):
helicopter, one hangar.
And each, ship had a little bitof a different role to it, But,
the landing safe officer is theguy who would decide that, you
know, when you have a city dockand safe to land.

Bryan (04:46):
So we got on this topic because we were talking about
teaching students to land onships. You you did that
initially just in a small spaceon land. Correct? Yes. Yeah.
And then on that course, did youtake them to land on a ship
eventually, or was that part oftheir operational training?

Duncan (05:03):
That's, generally part of their operational training,
but it could also be done bythe, instructors on, for all 6
quadrant.

Bryan (05:12):
So what's that like the first time you take a student
from doing it on land to doingit on a ship? What does that
feel like?

Duncan (05:20):
For the instructor, of course, it's, it's not terribly,
a big deal. But I think for thestudent, it probably, definitely
more challenging for them to, todo that do that right.

Bryan (05:34):
Yeah. So I've interviewed a cyclone pilot a a little while
ago, and I have to say themaritime helicopter role, it's
just got so many things about itthat are seems so challenging
and so intimidating. It I thinkyou've really gotta have guts to
do that job.

Duncan (05:51):
Well, it's kind of interesting because, I was
talking to a young snowbirdpilot at one point. He had only
been an instructor in Moose Jawand a snowbird pilot.

Bryan (06:01):
Okay.

Duncan (06:02):
And I said, Yeah. That's a really cool job you're doing,
but you should try flying a seaking at night. And he had to
think about it. He said, yeah.You're you're probably right.

Bryan (06:13):
Yeah. It's it's interesting because we do have
those those instructors. We callthem pipeliner pipeline
instructors or pipeliners. It'sgotta be an interesting, world
because you've only ever been inthe training system. Right.
So they've got an immense amountof experience in instruction and
in the in that world, but thenthey don't have that operational
experience. So it's a bit of atrade off. Yes. But, I have a

(06:35):
lot of respect for what they doand, for the time they put in.
And, I I don't know how it wasin the seventies, but certainly
nowadays in Moose Jaw, they'reputting in some long hours and
doing a lot of flying and a lotof good work.
So

Duncan (06:46):
Yeah. They they work very hard, and, they really know
their airplane well.

Bryan (06:50):
Oh, yeah. They're they're they're the pros for sure.

Intro (06:53):
Like Yeah.

Bryan (06:54):
Moose Jaw is probably one of the most intense flying
experiences I've ever had. Andthat was in part due to the,
expertise and intensity thatthose instructors brought to the
table.

Duncan (07:04):
Yep. I agree.

Bryan (07:08):
So back to your time training students, what key
lessons did you try to impart toyour students?

Duncan (07:14):
Well, one of the most important one is if, you know,
you think something is not quiteright, then you need to speak
up. Because if you seesomething, you say something.
Right? And, corporate resourcemanagement was a a fairly new
item Mhmm. That we talked about.

(07:36):
And, it doesn't matter howinexperienced you might be or
might feel. Quite often, theinsight that you get from
another pilot is something thatneeds to be said. You know?
Mhmm. The information beingpassed along.
And it's always important thatthat they do that.

Bryan (07:56):
Yeah. That's something we emphasized on the Aurora as
well, as as you, I'm sure,experienced once you were on
that fleet.

Duncan (08:03):
Yeah.

Bryan (08:03):
You've got 3 people in the flight deck and a whole crew
in the back end and all withvarying ranks and levels of
experience. And the the biggestthing you wanna encourage is
that passage of information. Andlike you said, if you see
something, say something. If younotice something's going wrong
or if you think, hey, that mightnot be right, The worst thing
that's gonna happen is the pilotor whoever you're saying it to

(08:25):
says, yep. Raj, that'sintentional, or, yeah, I'm
following that.
Thanks. You know? But you mightbe noticing something that no
one else has seen.

Duncan (08:32):
Yeah. Certainly, as a as an instructor, you you do the
ground duel, you follow the the,the syllabus, and you you teach
in ground duel, you teach in theairplane. But, sometimes it just
takes, you know, somebody askingthe right question. And as the
person would say, there there'sno dumb questions, only dumb

(08:55):
answers.

Bryan (08:55):
Yeah. How did you find the experience of going from
basically concentrating ongetting the job done to more of
a focus on mentorship?

Duncan (09:07):
Well, I certainly, found when you're, an instructor
pilot, you're trying to, youknow, as I've had, teach all the
skills and knowledge thatthey'll need to know, but you'll
also want them to be able to,make that transition to the
operational side of things. Wewanna make sure that they have
the all the information andtools that they need to be able

(09:30):
to do that.

Bryan (09:31):
Mhmm. I know it makes me think about someone that we both
know, Mary Cameron Kelly, whowas recently inducted into the I
think it's Canada's AviationHall of Fame. She was my
instructor on, the operationaltraining unit for the Aurora. We
call it Mote. And that was oneof the big things I noticed
about her when and she did a lotof my training through to

(09:54):
aircraft captain and crewcommander.
And one of the things I noticedabout her was that she wasn't
just teaching me how to do thejob. She was teaching me how to
be almost a good person and dothe job. Like, how do I she was
mentoring me in in how to be aleader and how to be not just a
pilot with your hands and feet,but a pilot in terms of how you
treat people and how youinteract with maintainers and

(10:15):
their crew and all that kind ofstuff.

Duncan (10:17):
Yeah. And, I was likely to add, you know, Mary as a crew
commander as well. And, whatyou're saying is absolutely
correct. I don't know what sheprobably the best pilot that I
ever flew with, but, a goodperson and, very conscientious
of, what the crew needs and whatthe crew does. Yeah.

(10:40):
That's that's important too.

Bryan (10:42):
Yeah. Mary is very well loved. And how how crazy is that
that you and I had the same crewcommander?

Duncan (10:47):
That is crazy. Yeah. And, we went to Hawaii together,
and it was a wonderful trip, Ihave to say. We, we stayed in
hotels out in, Hawaii. And whenwe came back, they told us we
could stop for gas, but weweren't allowed to, stay

(11:09):
overnight anywhere because we'dalready spent all the money that
that was in our budget.
So, I said, well, if we can'tstay overnight, we're not gonna
stop for gas unless we have to.So I had a couple of bases lined
up to to stop for, and I wouldcall them an hour beforehand and
say, thank, but no thanks. We wedon't do the gas. So we were

(11:31):
lucky, that, Greenwood was wideopen. I was throwing a 1,000,000
on the East Coast, And, we flewhome direct from, Hawaii, from,
Irving Point to Greenwood, about12 and a half hours.

Bryan (11:45):
You guys made it in one shot from Hawaii to Greenwood.

Duncan (11:48):
We did. One shot. And, the only way we could do it,
legally is by changing ourflight plan from IFR to VFR
flight plan. About an houroutside of Greenwood.

Bryan (11:59):
Oh, wow.

Duncan (11:59):
And we landed with, the legal legal fuel.

Bryan (12:02):
That's quite an accomplishment. I've I've done
the trip to Hawaii a couple oftimes and actually once with
Mary in 2016. And, we stoppedevery time in Comox, overnight
and then and then from Comox toGreenwood. So I've never done
that. That's a long trip.
I've never done

Duncan (12:17):
that before. Long trip. But as you know, stopping for
fuel somewhere only adds aminimum of few hours to your
flight time, hour to your day.And, more more than likely,
it'll be 3 or 4 hours by thetime you get back up the air.
So, I think, nope.
If we, if we don't need to,we're not gonna stop.

Bryan (12:39):
Yeah. And I don't know what the rules were like back
then, but you'd probably begetting close to busting your
crew day if, like, in terms ofthe maximum hours you could you
could be on duty if you hadstopped.

Duncan (12:48):
Yep.

Bryan (12:50):
So up next, you took a break from flying in your
career. After instructing on theSeaking, you were in charge of
the officer training courses atCFP Chilliwack and the summer
training courses for the regularofficer training plan. What did
these duties involve, and howdid your previous aviation
training aid you in them?

Duncan (13:07):
Basically, you were looking after the, the the
school in Chilliwack, makingsure that, well, we had the the
three schools assigned. Therewas the school in Cornwallis,
the school in Chilliwack, andthe, the school of Borden. So,
there were 3 of us that workedthe schedules, made sure

(13:29):
everything, worked the work theright way. And I would say the
the the skill that I employ themost was making something big
fit in a small space because youhad to make sure the schedule
worked right. You had to makesure that the summertime ROTP

(13:50):
students would be, gets ourbasic training done in during
the summer when they weren't inschool.
And, at the same time, you hadto keep keep the school happy.
And, they, were very, you know,they were looking after
instructors, of course, so theywanted to give people time off

(14:11):
and whatnot. But, so it was afine line sometimes to make sure
that people were doing the rightthing, getting the job done, but
keeping people happy at the sametime.

Bryan (14:21):
Yeah. Trying to meet the demands without basically
burning out your your people,which is always a balance in the
military.

Duncan (14:27):
Yeah. It is. It went 3 years, and, at the time, I was,
looking to go on and flysomething else. I wanted to make
sure because there was atendency to, once you were a sea
king pilot, they wanted to keepthat expertise. So Yep.
The farther you get away fromit, the better chance you're out

(14:50):
of moving on to something else.

Bryan (14:52):
Can I ask what made you wanna change from being a
seeking pilot?

Duncan (14:56):
Well, I I, indicated at the start that I I wanted to fly
a fixed wing aircraft.

Bryan (15:01):
Oh, right. The Hercules.

Duncan (15:03):
Yeah. Being in, in trend in training systems
headquarters, I saw that, thehurt balls were away a lot a lot
of time. And, that's the time Ihad a young family, so I really
didn't want to, do that. But Idid have a friend that was, on
IDD squadron, and, he called meup and said, would you be

(15:25):
interested in finding thetracker? And, I said, yeah.
That's, that sounds like thehome thing I'd want to do. So
that's how I ended up going tothe tracker.

Bryan (15:36):
Okay. And and that's something I think that's
important for listeners,especially we have, a lot of
listeners who are in themilitary flight training system
now or who are fairly early intheir career. I think it's
important to recognize sometimesthose dreams might change as
your life changes. As you getmarried, as you have kids, as
things change in your personalsituation, it's normal and it's
a good thing to sit back andreevaluate. Like, is this still

(15:58):
what fits for me?
What's the best fit for my liferight now?

Duncan (16:01):
That's right. Yep.

Bryan (16:03):
Yeah. So like you said, up next for you was the CP 121
tracker. What was the trackerlike to fly?

Duncan (16:10):
Well, I think I, I described the tractor as, like,
driving an old sports car. Yes.It was an older aircraft, and,
those big radial engines made alittle noise, but, it was a fun
aircraft to fly. And, certainly,the top up mission we did, we
had, I believe, 18 aircraft. 3quarters of them were

(16:35):
serviceable at the time, at anyone time.
That's pretty good. So on aweekend, if you want to go away
somewhere, you were able to dothat. So as long as, you know,
you would be, going to amilitary base, then everything
was taken care of in thatrespect. So, you weren't eating
up the budget by by going away.But you were getting, the

(16:58):
experience in the flying theaircraft in a generally more
intense, kind of labor intensivearea where they have lots of
aircraft flying around.

Bryan (17:09):
Yeah. For sure. We we've kinda said that before on the
show. Sometimes people will talkabout taking an aircraft on the
road on the weekend and going toa fun location, going somewhere
that they've always wanted togo. And I'm always concerned,
like, maybe someone will hearthat and think, well, hang on.
Like, they're just using theseaircraft, you know, for their
own travel. But there's no suchthing as a flight that doesn't
give you really valuabletraining, especially when you're

(17:30):
going somewhere new, somewherethat operates a little
differently, somewhere that hasmore, high density traffic. All
that stuff is really goodtraining.

Duncan (17:39):
Yep. Yep. And it's very important that all pilots know
how to fly in a in a highdensity traffic area.

Bryan (17:45):
Yep. Absolutely. That's such a key skill. If you're
doing it for the first timeunder some kind of adverse
conditions, you haven'tpracticed it before, you have no
training, and and now theweather's bad or you're having
an emergency or something likethat, it's just gonna be so
stressful. It's so important toget exposed to that experience,
I think I think early and oftenif possible.

Duncan (18:06):
Yeah. That's true.

Bryan (18:08):
So were you excited to finally make that switch from
rotary to fixed wing?

Duncan (18:12):
I was. And, it was kind of funny because, I don't know
whether if it's still like thatnow. But back in the day, I I
suspected that we overtrainedbecause as a career manager was
the the guy who looks after yourcareer, of course, and but he's
got a a number of files thathe's moving people around with.

(18:36):
He wanted me to have a refreshercourse. So he talked about,
going back to Moose Jaw, butthen he said, well, all those
courses are full.
So, maybe I'll get you on a twinOtter course. So I'm like, well,
wait a minute. You'll learn tofly the twin Otter before you
learn that fly the track. So,anyway, my friend, called me up

(18:59):
again, and he said, do youreally need a refresher course?
And, how about you just cometrackers, and we'll teach you
what you need?
And I said, that sounds good tome. I just wanna fly. So,
anyway, I went to to, SummerSide and did the, the Shracker
OTU. There were 3 of us, PaulTurpe and myself and and one who

(19:23):
was a returning Shracker pilot.And I believe, I do one more
trip than he did.
So, once again Yep. You talkabout, overtraining sometimes,
and other times, you just, youknow, do what's needed.

Bryan (19:38):
Yeah. Yeah. For sure. And and that's another name that
anyone who I have no idea if anyof my colleagues from the Aurora
days listen to this show, but,Paul Turpe is another well known
name in the Aurora community,another very well respected guy,
who's a great mentor to to newpilots. So that's really cool
that we have a couple colleaguesin common.

(19:59):
Yep. Did you find any particularchallenges switching from rotary
to fixed wing? I suppose you'dhad the fixed wing experience on
the Tudor. So was it pretty easyto make that switch?

Duncan (20:09):
Well, I think, because, of the I'm sorry. Graduating in
Muisha made a difference.Definitely, helicopter will fly
differently than, a fixed wingaircraft, but, as I had
mentioned, a friend of mine whowas on on trackers, took me for

(20:31):
my 1st tracker flight. The SeaKing would do a touch and go
landing, but the difference wasbecause of the wheels. The
difference was you level thenote.
So that didn't work on a trackervery well. And, I bounced a few
times, and I looked over at myinstructor, who was a friend of

(20:51):
mine. I was able to laugh at it.And they said and instead of
laughing, how about you howabout so you learn very quickly
to do a proper flight.

Bryan (21:00):
Yeah. I imagine so. Yeah.

Duncan (21:02):
The good thing about the tracker though was it was
designed to fly off a carrier.So the main gear was, pretty
hefty. It could take take a lotof bouncing.

Bryan (21:12):
Yeah. Pretty sturdy. Yep. So like the Aurora, the tracker
was a rare bird in that it wasan armed multi engine platform,
rare at least in the Canadianforces. What was it like to fire
rockets?
Was that exciting?

Duncan (21:24):
Yeah. It was, probably twice a year would go to the,
trackety range and, carry 2parts, 2 parts of rockets. You
could either fire them singly orfire a salvo. So, the range
basically had a target and, youhad a range safety officer, and
he would call your whether your,rockets hit the target or were

(21:48):
caught close off to the targetor whatever. So he would rate
your, your firing ability.
But the, the rocket could alsofire salvo. And, I got to do
that once where you put, put,most pods on to fire a salvo
and, all rockets fired at thesame time. That was very

(22:10):
exciting.

Bryan (22:11):
Yeah. I think that sounds really fun. Yeah. And did you
hit it?

Duncan (22:16):
Of course. Well, what a question.

Bryan (22:19):
Yeah. Yeah. You're a professional.

Duncan (22:21):
Well, it's interesting because, you know, we would
practice rocket runs, with thenavy, the type of exercises we
did. And, the procedure was tobe at low as close to the water
as possible, and you'd pop upand roll in on your target, fire
rockets, and, get away asquickly as possible. But, if you

(22:44):
ever had to do that in reallife, your odds of, doing the
second half of that, gettingaway unharmed, was unlikely. If
you never had to do that in reallife, that's fine coverage.

Bryan (22:57):
Yeah. So I was gonna ask that. So the tar intended target
of these rockets was these wereanti ship, rockets, essentially.

Duncan (23:05):
Correct. That's correct.

Bryan (23:06):
Yeah. That's interesting you describing that approach.
It's almost a cross between doyou think back to World War 2?
Sort of a cross between theapproach of a torpedo, aircraft
and and then popping up andalmost doing a dive bomb
profile. Exactly.

Duncan (23:20):
Yep. That's what you'll be doing.

Bryan (23:22):
Which were both very dangerous, John.

Duncan (23:24):
It would be a suicide mission. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You
you would hope to have yourtarget first.

Bryan (23:30):
Yeah. So like you said, thank goodness you never had to
do that in anger. No. And thiswas all during the height of the
Cold War. Right?

Duncan (23:37):
This was during the Cold War. So whether it be seeking
our tracker, whenever wedeployed, on the Eastland
Eastland or NATO, mission, we,always had company. People were
following us around and, youknow, seeing what the tactics
were. And we knew there was asubmarine underneath, as well.

(24:00):
So they were always there.

Bryan (24:02):
They were always, like, observing and trying to
basically analyze NATO tactics?

Duncan (24:07):
That's right. Yeah.

Bryan (24:09):
Yeah. That's interesting. I guess there must have been
more of a feeling during theCold War of like, okay. This
this could be for real. Like, wemight really need to use these.
We might really do a rocketattack. We might really need to
hunt a submarine.

Duncan (24:22):
That's correct. And, I mean, we called we were Cold War
warriors, but, I mean, war couldhave broken out at any time and,
almost did back in the time ofthe, Cuban Missile Crisis. But
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
You had to be prepared in case,you know, things got heated up.

Bryan (24:45):
Yeah. For sure. Thank goodness for JFK there. Yep. So
during your time with 880maritime reconnaissance
squadron, you flew the trackerto Bermuda and even to the
magnetic north pole.
Can you tell us more about theseexperiences?

Duncan (24:59):
Yeah. The tracker was quite often, like I said, flying
with the navy doing exercises.So, when the navy headed south,
then the tracker would bedeployed to Bermuda. They had
the fuel tanks down there thatthey, truck could use. And, when

(25:21):
I finally got on the trackerOTU, the operational training
unit, on our course, we were thelast 2 trackers that landed in
Bermuda.
We refilled them when we left.Those fuel tanks were
decommissioned. So we were thelast 2 trackers in Bermuda. The,

(25:43):
survey I took to the MontanaNorth Pole was on a, a northern
patrol. And, basically, what wedo is fly up north and land at
various locations up there, andwe would check on the new line
to make sure that the, you know,the radar's basically the
stations were were still thereand in one piece.

(26:06):
And, when we went to the,Montana North Pole, it was also
a bit of a show of the flagbecause there was a, a nice
station, located on the ice atthe Millennium War Room Wall,
and we we flew around them justalong the way we were there and
keeping an eye on them. Theywere inside outside, Canadian

(26:28):
Charter of water, but, we had tolet them know that we were
there.

Bryan (26:34):
Yeah. Now you mentioned the due line. Can you explain to
listeners? Probably some of ouryounger listeners don't know
what the DEW line is. Can youexplain what that is?

Duncan (26:42):
Yeah. There was a a system of radars across the
north, basically, looking foranybody that would enter the
North American area, whether itbe, no, airplanes transiting to
the United States or areentering Canadian airspace that
shouldn't be there. So, the newline was, like I say, a a

(27:06):
collection of radars that wereacross the north, and we would
have to have a clearance. These2 enter Canadian airspace.

Bryan (27:16):
New line stood for distant early warning.

Duncan (27:18):
Yep.

Bryan (27:19):
The other question I really wanted to ask you about
flying to the magnetic northpole was what was your compass
doing? Was it basically justspinning around?

Duncan (27:27):
The compass was just spinning around. And, when you
go up north, you would operatewhat we call your mega system in
true. In other words, the themagnetic your composite and your
magnetic system was useless toyou, so you offered everything

(27:50):
in true.

Bryan (27:51):
In, in to true north?

Duncan (27:53):
Yep.

Bryan (27:54):
Yep. And that's, of course, for anyone familiar with
northern operations, still donetoday, Well, because you have
to. But Yeah. Because you haveto. It was it's a lot easier
nowadays, though, with theadvent of of GPS and all those
different things.
Was there any extra challengesinvolved in flying up north,
when you were up there?

Duncan (28:12):
Well, like I said, you had to, have somebody teach you
how you, run the Omega system intrue. Once you knew how to do
it, it wasn't, wasn't thatterribly complex. But, until you
knew how to do it and hadconfidence in it, that it would
get you home. The, ADF system orthe, direction finding system

(28:39):
basically is a signal sign outfrom, tower to any aircraft.
And, up north, they were quitestrong.
So, I mean, you could, dial inon a ADF system and know exactly
where you were.

Bryan (28:58):
Okay. So you had you had some other ways to back up your
Omega system

Duncan (29:03):
Yeah.

Bryan (29:03):
In true and That's right. And use those ADFs to make to
confirm basically where youwere.

Duncan (29:07):
Yeah.

Bryan (29:09):
We've touched a little on this, but what were the roles
the tracker served in?

Duncan (29:13):
Well, like I said, doing the, exercises for the navy, a
combat exercise where, the navywould, sign you either to, look
at an area. They don't want youto do, do a surface search, and
make sure that they, the find orfoe kinda thing. And, the other

(29:35):
one is, just a surveillancesystem. Like I said, the
northern patrol, well, it's thechild of 5, and and seeing who's
around, see if they're up there.And, the fisher patrol.
Yeah. Quite often, we will flyout of, Saint John's, and we'll
work for the department offisheries when we're over there.
And, they would have certainareas where they wanted you to

(29:57):
look at. And, you were out onthe Grand Banks quite a bit.
Yeah.
And, there is an area known as aFlemish Gap, which is quite far
out. And, tracker is interestingbecause it actually burns more
fuel if you have an enginefailure, because you're using
the one engine to fly on. And,so your prudent limit of

(30:23):
endurance was SPLE, which issingle engine with limit of
endurance. So you would, haveto, you only have about 15 to 20
minutes on the Farametch cap andbefore you have to return to,
back to Saint John's.

Bryan (30:39):
Oh, wow. So it's a little further out than I was thinking.

Duncan (30:41):
Yep. Yeah. It's quite far out, past the 200 mile
limit.

Bryan (30:46):
Did you guys on the tracker do much ASW or anti
submarine warfare?

Duncan (30:51):
Once we lost the the carrier Bonaventure, the, most
of the equipment for, antisubmarine warfare was removed,
and it became just a, coastalreconnaissance aircraft.
Although we, we still carry afusion of the boys, certainly
not the number that we used to,when the aircraft was, on the
ASW platform.

Bryan (31:13):
Okay. That's pretty interesting. And I guess that
would just be because once youwere not operating off a ship,
you were no longer really usingthat role to screen the high
value asset, or the carrier.

Duncan (31:24):
Yeah. Correct. And, it, it limited the range too in, in
what you could do.

Bryan (31:30):
Oh, yeah. Of course.

Duncan (31:31):
What they had done is they had installed a fuel tank
in the, down where underneathwhere the, torpedoes would
normally be. And, interestinglyenough, you have to use that
fuel first and make sure that,you know because there was no
gauge to tell you how much wasin it. You wanna make sure that

(31:52):
tank goes full. And, so you usethat first and then your wing
tanks.

Bryan (31:56):
Okay. So similar then to the Aurora with the center tank
and then the wing tanks.

Duncan (32:01):
Correct. Yeah. Except for the Aurora, I think
everything was pretty muchautomatic, although with the
flight and air, we'll definitelyselect which position you want
it. In the tracker, you woulddefinitely wanna make sure that
toggle switch is thrown openfirst and make sure that the the

(32:22):
the field's coming a lot. Thanksfor it.

Bryan (32:24):
That's funny to hear you say that the Aurora is more
automatic because, of course, wewe thought of the Aurora as we
were flying it, you know, in in2012 as as fairly manual
compared to a lot of modernaircraft. Yeah. But, of course,
it'd be far more automatic thanthe tracker, which was truly
manual.

Duncan (32:41):
Yep. That's true. But, you know what? The the tracker
had a very nice, autopilotbecause although it was old, it
it it had something where youcould dial down your altitude.
So you could dial it down to,what, a 500 feet a minute of
descent, and, it would holdthat.

Bryan (33:02):
Oh, really? Yep. Which is pretty advanced, autopilot for
the the seventies.

Duncan (33:07):
Yes. It was. Yep.

Bryan (33:08):
And for an aircraft that at that time was already fairly
old.

Duncan (33:11):
Yep. That's correct. The other, the other aspect I found
kinda strange when I made thetransition to the Aurora was
that, we had on the tracker, wehad what's called handheld
radio, for STAR SAT.

Bryan (33:27):
So when you say STAR SAT, search and rescue satellite.
Right?

Duncan (33:30):
Yeah. That's correct. In the Aurora, it was a Gibson
girl, which at the time, I wassaying, well, the tracker just
retired. Why don't you take theradios from the tracker and put
them in the Aurora and get ridof the Gibson girl? But,

Bryan (33:45):
And for the listeners, it's funny you say that. I I
just finished volunteering alittle bit last year at the
Aviation Museum in Winnipeg, andthey have a Gibson Girl. And for
listeners, a Gibson Girl is ahand cranked rescue radio that
you had to crank to transmit on.So, basically, Duncan went from
an older aircraft that hadmodern day SAR search and rescue

(34:07):
satellite radios and then wentto the Aurora, which had a hand
cranked radio.

Duncan (34:11):
Yeah. Correct. But, of course, any kind of equipment
change will require, as youknow, everything to be approved
by Ottawa, and it would have tobe, I forget the term.

Bryan (34:27):
Essentially validated for flight. Right. Yeah. And which
is always a big process.

Duncan (34:31):
Yeah. A big process. Yeah.

Bryan (34:34):
So as we've said, the tracker was eventually
decommissioned and you foundyourself flying Auroras. How did
the Aurora and the trackercompare in terms of how they
flew and operated?

Duncan (34:43):
Oh, huge a huge difference because, LSAT, the
tracker was, with the oldengines on the old radial
engines. It was quite loud. TheAurora was like, and now you're
moving from a, an older mucholder aircraft to a more modern
aircraft, a 4 engine aircraft,very much more capable of doing,

(35:09):
different things and and flyinga lot longer. Mhmm. The biggest
thing I liked about the Aurorawas to be able to go back and
get a coffee.

Bryan (35:16):
Yeah. That was one of my favorite things too.

Duncan (35:19):
And, also, being able to use the washroom. That's, very
important. Yes. Yep. Yep.

Bryan (35:24):
Yep. Honestly, my 2 one of my two things when I was
choosing an aircraft, was that Iwanted to be able to get a
coffee and use the bathroom. Sothe Aurora checked those boxes.

Duncan (35:33):
There you go. Hollies are the same no matter what.

Bryan (35:37):
Yep. That's right. And in terms of, how they handled as an
aircraft, how do they compare?

Duncan (35:46):
To tell you the truth, the Aurora was a big airplane.
So when you're down at 200 feet,you had to be very, very careful
about, you know, make sure youdidn't didn't do a turn
unencourined in a turn kind ofthing because you could lose,
off road very quickly.

Bryan (36:04):
Yep.

Duncan (36:05):
I found with the tracker, you were much you you
could feel what the aircraft wasdoing much more slow than you
could with the arm.

Bryan (36:14):
So tracker was a little more forgiving down low?

Duncan (36:16):
Yeah. Oh, yeah. For sure. Like, I had no problem
flying a tracker down to 50 feetif necessary.

Bryan (36:24):
Mhmm.

Duncan (36:24):
You would only do that with an Aurora?

Bryan (36:27):
No. No. For sure. We we don't go that low in the Aurora.

Duncan (36:31):
Yeah. Yeah. And, anyway, I I I did find that the Aurora
was, very nice to take up a highaltitude and go along trips.

Bryan (36:42):
Yep. Yeah. It's a comfortable plane, and it's got
lots of power. Great great forclimbing, lots of power down
low.

Duncan (36:48):
Yep. What a lot of people, maybe don't know is
that, when you're on patrol, youshut down the measure. So call
it loitering, number 1, which,we could do from time to time as
as necessary to save fuel. Yep.Because you're not going that
fast.
You're, you're doing staying inyour, or your own area. In a

(37:12):
search and rescue situation, youcan, in the lower weight, once
you've burned off some fuel, youcan loiter, 2 engines. So now
you're down to 2 engine, andthere's an altered restriction
because, of course, if you dohave a problem with one of your
operating engines, you have tostart the other engine, fairly
quickly.

Bryan (37:33):
Mhmm. Yeah. We used to do that for training sometimes. I I
tried to do it as often aspossible just to get people
comfortable with it because it'struthfully, it's a little
uncomfortable to be flying a 4engine aircraft and to have 2
engines turned off. You reallywanna make sure everybody's
familiar with those procedures,ready for what we do next if
something goes wrong.
There's a lot of briefinginvolved before you do it.

(37:55):
Right. But I thought it waspretty cool that the Aurora was
able to do that.

Duncan (37:58):
Yeah. And, you know, the airplane flies quite well on 2
engines. Yep. But, it doesn'tfly very well on 1.

Bryan (38:07):
No. But you can, so something that it's funny. Mary
Cameron Kelly showed me this.One thing we used to do
sometimes is when we were downto 2 engines, go up to a we're
up at a nice safe altitude, andyou pull one of the remaining
engines back to idle and thentell the crew, okay, crew. We're
essentially on one engine rightnow.
This is what it would feel like.Yep. We're descending at this

(38:30):
rate. We would have this manyminutes until we hit the water
in which we would start otherengines. We can easily do that.
Yep. So now you can see thateven if we were to lose an
engine, we're not falling out ofthe sky. And it would make
people have a lot moreconfidence in going down to 2
engines.

Duncan (38:45):
Yep. Yeah. So doing it and, having the rest of the crew
see it being done, veryimportant to say as a confidence
that that it has thatcapability.

Bryan (38:56):
Yeah. I agree. I agree for sure. So one thing I wanted
to explain to the listenersquickly is why is it more
efficient to have 3 engines on ahigher power setting rather than
4 engines on a lower powersetting? So, basically, we're
doing this in a situation, likeDuncan said, where you're
loitering in a small area.
You're probably doing, ASW andsubmarine warfare or you're

(39:17):
doing search and rescue work.You're not trying to go
somewhere high and fast. You'restaying down low. And,
basically, the short answer isin a turbine engine, in a
turboprop, the hotter theturbine is burning, the more
fuel efficient it is. So it'sactually more efficient to have
3 engines set at a hotter,higher power setting than to
have 4 engines set low.
And that's that's it in anutshell.

Duncan (39:37):
Yeah. And you explained that that much better than I
could.

Bryan (39:44):
So what would you say were some of the highlights of
your time on the Aurora?

Duncan (39:48):
Definitely, the trips that we did. We flew over
Iceland, and we went toScotland. The operation, that we
did with the Dutch 3, the 3Dutch p threes, Operation Mana,
It was 50 years since, thatoperation took place. And what

(40:10):
happened was at the end of WorldWar 2, when the Germans were
pulling out of Holland, theyblew a lot of the, dikes and the
dams, and, a lot of the villageswere isolated by water. So
people, really were having ahard time getting enough food.
So very quickly, bomber commandconverted some of the planes

(40:34):
from dropping bombs to be ableto drop food. So they would fly
over, and, of course, mannameans food from heaven. Right?
Mhmm. So, they would, they saveda lot of lives by dropping those
supplies down to them.
And it was 50 years later thatwe did the formation flight with

(40:54):
them in commemorating OperationMana, and, it was a 52 plane
formation flight that flew allover, Holland, just to, let
people know that, we were stillthinking of them. And the
Canadians are very welcome overin the the Netherlands because

(41:18):
of at the end of World War 2,the country was liberated by by
the Canadian troops. And it wasa very, a very moving experience
for us to be able to do that forthem.

Bryan (41:33):
Yeah. That sounds amazing. To have the opportunity
to go there to a place with sucha deep connection to Canada must
have been really something.

Duncan (41:41):
Yeah. It was. And like I said, we were looking down at
all the people that were runningthe streets and, even, Schiphol
Airport. We flew right over it,and, they stopped everybody from
moving until, the formation, wasturned around and and headed
back towards, our variousdispersal locations. So it was,

(42:05):
it was quite moving.

Bryan (42:06):
And I'll just note for the listeners, you you mentioned
the that your information with 3Dutch p threes. A p 3 is what
the rest of the world calls a CP140 Aurora. The CP 140 is the
Canadian name. Everyone elsecalls it a p 3 Orion. Just
something to note.
So, basically, he was information with a couple other or
with 3 other, Auroras. Werethere any big challenges,

(42:27):
involved in coordinating withthat many nations and that many
aircraft?

Duncan (42:31):
Well, first of all, to, get authorization to do the
formation, we had to get thepermission to be able to do that
from from Ottawa. So we did agood practice quite a bit with
another Aurora before going overthere. Once we were there, we,
had a briefing with the, theoperators of the Dutch p threes,

(42:54):
and, it was a very, verydetailed, what what can and
can't happen

Bryan (42:59):
Mhmm.

Duncan (43:00):
During the flight. And, yeah, it was very interesting,
working with, with them andcoordinating with them. So it it
was very interesting, as I said.

Bryan (43:13):
And, listeners who do check out the video that Duncan
has, online from our show notes,there are some photos there of
that of that experience,close-up photos with information
with those Dutch p threes andsome of the pictures of the
formation, and it is it's reallycool. Speaking of formation
flying, you flew all 3operational aircraft you've

(43:34):
flown in formation. Which onewas your favorite, and which was
the most nerve racking? And howwere the experiences different?

Duncan (43:41):
Yeah. I I flew, a 3 plane on the sea gang, a 5 plane
with the tracker because at theend, when the, truck was being
decommissioned, we had plannedto fly over share water in
Halifax in Summerside on our wayto Mountain View in Ontario. So
we practice that. And, beingnumber 4 in a 5 plane, the old

(44:06):
accordion effect, takes place.And, the engines on a tracker
are not quite as responsive as,the Aurora engine.

Bryan (44:15):
Okay.

Duncan (44:16):
So you're playing with a throttle quite a bit. But you're
still still trying to be assmooth as you can for number 5,
which is, that's Taylor andCharlie, and, he's really really
feeling the accordion effect.

Intro (44:29):
Right.

Duncan (44:30):
So, yeah, that was a challenge. And, of course, the
flying information with theAurora, a bigger crane. You
don't wanna be, enter yourposition too much. Too close and
not too far either because I'mhere. You're gonna be paying
catch up.

Bryan (44:49):
Yeah. So which was the most challenging then? Probably
the tracker because you're inposition number 4?

Duncan (44:55):
Yeah. I would say the tracker, but seeking was
challenging too because, it wasquite often referred to as a
bunch of loose parts of flyinginformation. So when you're
flying formation with a bunchof, parts flying information,
it, yeah, it can be challenging.

Bryan (45:11):
Yeah. I imagine. A little nerve racking maybe. So your
career also included a stint asthe recruiting detachment
commander in Corner Brook,Newfoundland where you were
heavily involved in recruiting.What led you to take on this
role, and what was theexperience like?

Duncan (45:26):
Well, when the tracker was decommissioned, of course,
then you had a lot of peoplethat had to go to various other
jobs. So, I would havepreferred, of course, to go
offline somewhere else. But atthe time, we were experiencing
the apology surplus, and so Ichose recruiting to go to. Being

(45:48):
in that for the 1st 2 years,probably, I enjoyed it because
giving jobs to people who reallyneed the the really want a
position, that's, that's reallyimportant. So, the first few
years, there was a lot of, a lotof job openings.

(46:09):
Any, other attachments thatcouldn't fill the position, we
could. And and things sloweddown, and they weren't
recruiting as much as they hadbeen. So we had, another another
2 years that I, I tried to keepthe staff over there, motivated.

(46:30):
So, it was a staff of 7 7 or 8,8 people, I guess. And, that was
a challenge, keeping peoplemotivated to even though we had
slowed down quite a bit, you youstill wanted them to be able to
do the job properly.

Bryan (46:47):
What was causing that slowdown? I

Duncan (46:50):
think at the time, I think the military might have
been readjusting quite a bit.Like I say, we had lost a
tracker, and I think other unitshad lost their positions as
well. So, I guess there was aninflux of people, and and now
suddenly, just slowed down.Kinda like, you know, kinda like

(47:14):
formation flying, you know,where

Bryan (47:16):
Mhmm.

Duncan (47:16):
Where, things happen really fast, and now it's time
to slow down. So

Bryan (47:21):
Yep. Okay. This wasn't during, the forced production
period, was it?

Duncan (47:27):
Yes. It may have been. Yep. Okay. So

Bryan (47:30):
that may have had something to do with it as well.

Duncan (47:32):
Initially as a as a starter sort of a. Yep. Okay.

Bryan (47:36):
Yeah. So that must have been pretty challenging to keep
people going and keep peoplemotivated. I I find it's very
it's a lot harder to be theperson who's setting the tone.
It's a lot easier to get sweptalong with how people are
feeling, especially when moralestarts to, be a little lower.
It's very hard to be thetrendsetter who keeps things,
upbeat.
So how did you do that?

Duncan (47:57):
Yeah. It was a it was a challenge, kinda like feast and
famine. We went through thefeast. Now we have the famine.
But, we did, quite a bit ofadventure training.
We we were working, fairlyclosely with the reserve unit
over there. We had and startedrecruiting for them. And, to do
that, we wanted to know exactlywhat it was they they were

(48:20):
doing. So we had some, sometraining, some adventure
training, which was, which wasinteresting. We went with them
and out into the field, and wedid all the stuff that we
normally do to set up a campand, had to rely a little bit on

(48:41):
what I had done during my basictraining.
How to learn to be, my basicgrande again, I guess, or an
infantry soldier. But that wasthe intro. Yeah. Very, very
challenging and and veryinteresting.

Bryan (48:57):
Yeah. And, I mean, you guys were in Newfoundland, so
it's a great place to beoutside. That's one of the the
big pastimes of living inNewfoundland and Labrador is
time outside. People love tohunt and fish and hike and all
those things. Right?
It's Yeah. It's got a lot ofbeautiful spaces. Yeah. Correct.

Duncan (49:13):
One of the things we did was go up to Gros Morne National
Park.

Bryan (49:17):
Oh, beautiful.

Duncan (49:18):
And we took a day and we went up there, and I took
several of the staff and weclimbed Rosemarie mountain. And,
I remember sitting halfway up.We just thought to take a little
rest, and we could see someonecoming. Basically, it was like,
almost like a gully on a lot ofrocks. And as it turns out, it

(49:42):
was a a young girl, and, shedashed that high and kept right
on going.
She didn't need to stop for usat all. Like, I think she had
done it before.

Bryan (49:53):
Yep. Yeah. I guess so. Put you guys to shame a little
bit. Yeah.
So let's talk a little bit aboutyour transition to civilian life
and your community involvement.After 27 years of service, you
transitioned to civilian lifewhile continuing as a reservist
in Greenwood operations foranother 8 years. How did you
navigate this change, and whatadvice would you give to other

(50:14):
service members facing a similartransition? And did you find
joining the reserves helped easeyour transition to civilian
life?

Duncan (50:21):
I definitely did. At the time, I wasn't sure what I
wanted to do. So, one of the,guys I work with said, well, how
about you consider joining yourreserves, and you can continue
to to do the same job? And, itwould just be 10 days a month.

(50:41):
And, so I decided that thissounded pretty good.
So I made the transition to thereserve unit. And, it's kind of
a funny story with that onebecause I had done the
interview, and everything lookedgood. And, so I had done my last
shift as a a reg force officer.And, on the next shift, I was,

(51:06):
back at work, and I got a phonecall. It was the reserve unit,
and they said, captain McCarjek,where are you at right now?
And, I'd work, of course. And,she said, well, you do have to
sign some papers first. Youknow? So oh, yeah. Yeah.
There's that part of it too. So,anyway, I, I, took an hour or so

(51:28):
when I went to those area ofunits and, did the paperwork
that was required.

Bryan (51:32):
Do you have any advice you'd give to service members
who are maybe getting to the endof a long career?

Duncan (51:37):
Well, it it is interesting because, I was
reading, the Legion Magazine,which we as the Legion member,
you got the some magazine. Theyare talking about recruiting in
the Canadian Forces. Right now,we're short about 15,000
positions, which is a lot. Andthey were talking about even,

(51:59):
somebody transitingtransitioning to the reserve
position can take anywhere from6 months to 2 years. Wow.
And, I think I I just told youhow quickly my my situation,
changed, but that was back in,you know, 2,001. So a little bit
different now. It takes a bit abit longer. That, definitely, is

(52:23):
something that, someone shouldconsider, if they haven't, you
know, decided what exactly theywanna do. And, anyway, look at a
reserve position if you, if youthink that, that would be a
suitable position for you.

Bryan (52:41):
Okay. You're actively involved in your community,
particularly with the Lions Cluband the Royal Canadian Legion.
What drives your passion forcommunity service, and how do
you see it connecting to yourmilitary background?

Duncan (52:52):
Well, I think that, you know, depending on what
organization you you, belong to,I always said that, you know,
with my military career, wemoved around quite a bit, and,
so really didn't, weren't ableto join any kind of,
organization that want to keeppeople for a long term. So, I

(53:18):
said once I get out, of theright force or the regular
force, anyway, I would look at,or other organizations. So, the
Lions Club, we were living inHanford at the time, and, they
needed new members. We, when wejoined, they probably had around

(53:38):
30 to 35 members. And, now we'redown to probably about 16
members.
So

Bryan (53:47):
Okay.

Duncan (53:47):
And we we are the young young ones in our club right
now. Oh, wow. So we're having ahard time getting, newer and
younger members to join, whetherit be our club or any other
club. Getting somebody tovolunteer their services, it's,
it seems to be a harder thing todo now.

Bryan (54:08):
Why do you think that is? Do you think there's some kind
of generational difference interms of how people view
community service?

Duncan (54:15):
Is there maybe? I know that, certainly people are maybe
having fewer kids or fewerchildren than they had in the
past, but, they're very active.I mean, they're they have their
children involved in a couple ofdifferent sports, a couple of
different, kind oforganizations. They're very
busy. So, there is that aspectto it as well.

(54:39):
So I think when you get olderand your kids are a little old,
growing up, then it makes itmakes it easier to look around
and decide what you wanna do.But, I have always felt that the
service to the community,service to others is is
important.

Bryan (54:59):
Yeah. I agree for sure. And and that's something like
that's one of the positivethings we've mentioned Air
Cadets in this show so manytimes, but it's one of the great
things that Air Cadets teachesyoung people is service to the
community and and the value ofthat.

Duncan (55:12):
Yeah. It does. And that, it definitely sets a tone for,
how you look at life and whatyou wanna do later on as you
progress in your career.

Bryan (55:24):
Your work with the Legion also involves helping veterans
navigate the Veterans AffairsCanada system. Can you tell us
more about that and how veteranscan get help from the Legion?

Duncan (55:32):
Yeah. A lot of misunderstanding about what the
legion stands for. And, the,service officer, which most
branches have, you don't have tobe a member of the legion. You,
if you're a veteran, you can goin there and talk to the service
officer. And if you have aninjury that, has been documented

(55:54):
before you leave the service,then you have a better chance of
a plan of, be having asuccessful claim.
Also, as a a service officer,you generally know the procedure
that is required to get furtheraffairs involved. And quite

(56:18):
often, sometimes a veteran willthink that, they don't wanna do
it because the money is comingout of someone else's pocket,
and that's certainly not thecase.

Bryan (56:27):
Mhmm.

Duncan (56:27):
The money is there for them if they need it. And that's
quite often the biggestchallenge as a service officer
that you would face. Mostcommands have a command service
officer. So if your branch thatyou, are going to for help can't
help you, certainly, theircommand service officer can.

Bryan (56:49):
Okay. So if you if there are veterans listening who think
they may have some form ofclaimable injury, the their
first step could be to go totheir local legion and ask for
help with with, Yeah. Navigatingthat system.

Duncan (57:02):
They can do it on their own. They can, go to the
National Affairs website, seewhat is required, and go through
the process. But, certainly, bygoing to the lesion and, having
a service officer talk to youand, tell you exactly what you
need, it it can be a great help.And, certainly, someone who is

(57:25):
dealing with PTSD or some otherkind of injury like that, then,
help is definitely needed. Andhaving someone else that can
help you navigate through thesystem, that, definitely, can
help a person.

Bryan (57:43):
For sure. I I didn't personally use Allegion, but
when I went through VeteransAffairs, I did have people who
helped me who helped mentor methrough the process. And I will
say as somebody who has a mentalhealth issue, it was a huge
benefit to me to just havesomebody there to kind of
confirm that what I was doingwould likely result in success
and just to have that comfortingsecond set of eyes on on the

(58:07):
application. The other thing Iwould wanna emphasize for
listeners is that you don't haveto be out of the military to
apply for Veterans Affairscompensation. So if you have a
service injury that's chronic,has lasted more than, I believe
they say, 6 months, and it'sservice related and it's
documented, you need to have adiagnosis, you can apply to
Veterans Affairs Canada for thatcondition.

Duncan (58:28):
Yeah. You can. And quite often, veteran affairs will deal
with someone who is already inthe military and, or the RCMP.

Bryan (58:38):
Yep. Absolutely. Yep. I did that while I was still in,
and, there's no problem withthat. And and, also, I should
note, your chain of commanddoesn't get notified or anything
like that.
So people who are afraid ofcareer ramifications because,
oh, I have this injury, but I'mnot really, maybe I'm maybe I'm
scared to let the doctor know orsomething like that. Veterans
Affairs handles everythingseparately from the military.

(59:00):
They don't notify the militarywhen you apply for a disability
pension or anything like that.So it's it's certainly worth
looking into.

Duncan (59:07):
Yeah. That's that's that's correct. And it's very
important for people tounderstand that, everything
veteran affairs does isconfidential and, only only
between you and them.

Bryan (59:19):
So I'd like to as we get close to the end here, I'd like
to ask for your advice for newpilots. The first thing I wanna
ask is what was the mostimportant thing you would do to
keep yourself ready for yourjob?

Duncan (59:31):
Well, certainly, depending on what aircraft
you're flying, what kind ofmission you're doing, the more
you could be prepared, you know,the better your job would go.
And so, whether that be lookingat at the weather, at the
aircraft's service availability,all of those considerations

(59:53):
that, like, when do, a afinancial mission, they must be
considered. I mean, you knowwhat? That's very important.

Bryan (01:00:03):
Mhmm. So, essentially, being being very thorough and
having that thoroughpreparation.

Duncan (01:00:08):
And and being prepared. Yep. Yeah. And quite often,
circumstances will changerapidly and, require you to do
things maybe a little differentthan than what you had planned
on.

Bryan (01:00:23):
That is true. Flexibility is extremely important.
Flexibility is the key to airpower as they say.

Duncan (01:00:28):
It is the key.

Bryan (01:00:31):
What would you say makes a good pilot? What skills, both
technical and personal, areessential for success in this
field?

Duncan (01:00:38):
Yep. Well, being able to, like I said, make make that
decision very quickly ifrequired. Knowing your own
abilities, that's important.Knowing, what other pilots, if
you're on a multi, crewedaircraft, knowing their
abilities, that's important aswell, and, just being prepared.

Bryan (01:01:04):
Drawing on your vast experience, what key advice
would you offer to aspiringpilots currently in training?
What are the biggest challengesthey might face, and how can
they overcome those challenges?

Duncan (01:01:15):
Well, I always think about the motivational video
that, I have on my YouTubechannel. It's really important
that you know what you wanna do,but it's even more important to
love what you do. And, I'vealways said that there are 2

(01:01:36):
types of polyps. There's anatural and, people who love it.
And, sometimes you can be both,but, loving what you do makes
all the difference in the world.
And, you're gonna work harder ifit's, you love what you do.

Bryan (01:01:53):
And I would argue that loving flying, it's not it's not
necessarily a requirement ofbeing a military pilot, but,
man, that is gonna get youthrough those long days of
study, those simulator sessions,the ground school, all the stuff
that's not the flashy excitingparts of flying because there is
so much that goes on behind thescenes to be a successful pilot

(01:02:15):
in the military.

Duncan (01:02:16):
Yep. That's true.

Bryan (01:02:18):
Well, Duncan, thank you so much for this chat today.
It's been such a treat to learnabout your career and hear about
these awesome aircraft thatyou've flown. And I just truly
appreciate you taking the timeout of your day to be a guest on
the show today. So thank youvery much.

Duncan (01:02:33):
Well, thanks for the opportunity, and I really
enjoyed it. Can I, close with aquote? Yeah. Absolutely. Once
you have tainted flight, youwill forever walk the earth with
your eyes turned skyward.
For there, you have been, andthere, you will always long to
return.

Bryan (01:02:53):
Alright. That wraps up part 2, our discussion on Duncan
McKizick's career andremembrance day. For our next
episode, we'll sit down withBen, a special operations forces
operator who decided to switchto pilot. We'll talk about why
he made the switch, what hisexperience has been like on
phase 1 flight training, andwhat his successes and
challenges have been so far onthe next episode of the pilot

(01:03:14):
project podcast. Do you have anyquestions or comments about
anything you've heard in thisepisode?
Would you or someone you knowmake a great guest? Do you have
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for listening today and ask youfor your help with the big three

(01:03:36):
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Thanks for listening. Keep theblue side up. See you.