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Second World War hero returns to its Island roots

Restoration of amphibious Catalina a labour of love for North Saanich man

In a preservation project dubbed “the Cat came back,” a group of Victoria aircraft buffs are restoring a Second World War plane, a PBY Catalina.

It’s a project to restore a plane that flew real patrol duties during the Second World War from the RCAF station at Pat Bay.

Back then, the plane was known as RCAF 11024, and its first home was in No. 3 Operational Training Unit RCAF Station Pat Bay. It would also serve a long and distinguished career all across Canada in military and civilian roles.

“It will be one of the few warbirds in the world that actually represents itself,” said Pat Phillips, president of the Catalina Preservation Society.

“It’s not somebody’s else’s airplane with a different name on it,” said Phillips. “It’s the actual plane that flew actual missions out of Pat Bay during the war.”

People involved in the plane’s restoration include 93-year-old Russell Redman of Victoria, who flew anti-submarine patrols in RCAF 11024 during the Second World War.

Another, Dave Scott, 65, of Langley agreed to donate original markings for 11024 produced at his company, Nurndy Graphics.

Scott said he was delighted to help because his father, Edward Henry Scott, who died in 2005, was a wartime Catalina pilot. His logbook reveals he flew 11024 on several missions from Pat Bay.

The aircraft type, the PBY Catalina, is a flying boat, designed to take off and touch down on water. About 4,000 were built, 620 in Canada, and it would become one of most widely used, reliable and storied aircraft of the war.

One story occurred on May 26, 1941, two days after the German ship Bismarck sank the British battleship HMS Hood. It was men flying a PBY from Scotland who spotted the Hood’s killer in the Atlantic. The next day, Royal Navy ships engaged Bismarck and sank it.

Over in the Pacific theatre, on June 4, 1942, it was pilots and observers in a PBY who spotted a Japanese carrier strike force about 220 nautical miles northwest of Midway Atoll. Alerted, American air and naval forces achieved a decisive victory.

Throughout the war, the Catalina had many names. Designed and built in the U.S., it was first called PBY, for Patrol Bomber, by the abbreviation-loving Americans. The Y was the U.S. navy’s symbol for manufacturer Consolidated Aircraft.

Sold to the British, it was called the Catalina by the Royal Air Force, after the small island off San Diego where RAF officials first viewed the plane.

Later, when downed American airmen were rescued from the sea, they called the flying boat a “Cat.” When it was patrolling and bombing, it was a PBY. A version built under licence in Canada became known as Canso.

Now many say “Canso” refers to the 800-odd amphibious versions, built with wheeled landing gear that allowed them to touch down on land and water.

RCAF 11024 was a wheeled version built in the Cartierville, Quebec, Vickers factory. It arrived on Vancouver Island in July 1943. At the war’s end, the plane left Pat Bay and became one of the first aircraft to form the new Search and Rescue Group for the RCAF. The plane flew in that role from Newfoundland to Vancouver.

In 1961, RCAF 11024 was retired and sold into civilian hands to a company called Airspray. The plane lost its military numbers and became C-FUAW.

In 1966, C-FUAW was bought by a company called Kenting, which converted it to a freighter/water bomber. The blister-style canopies on the rear fuselage, used by observer/machine gunners, and the one in the nose were removed.

The plane was later sold to Norcan Air, which flew it over northern Saskatchewan. It was then sold to the Saskatchewan government to be used as one of a small fleet of water bombers to fight forest fires.

In the early 1990s, C-FUAW was sold to Buffalo Airways. The plane was painted yellow and red and used over the Northwest Territories before it was parked in Hay River, N.W.T.

It sat there until 2010, when it was found by Bob Dyck of North Saanich. A commercial pilot with hundreds of hours on Catalina water bombers and flying freight over Africa, Dyck has a real fondness for the aircraft, which he still calls “the unsung hero” of the Second World War.

Dyck had become horrified at the number of Canadian heritage aircraft leaving the country for museums and collections overseas. So he was hoping to find a Catalina for preservation.

“I just decided to step up to the plate and do something,” he said.

In anticipation, before he located a suitable Catalina, he had purchased the Plexiglas blister canopies and the Plexiglas for the nose turret.

In 2010, Dyck heard of a Catalina sitting in Hay River. After checking out its history, Dyck said he realized he had found his plane.

“I started doing the research on it. I found it had actually been based in Victoria during the Second World War,” Dyck said. “I thought: ‘This must be the one.’”

He struck a deal for $300,000, his own money, spent a few days with an aircraft-mechanic pal making it airworthy, and flew it to Victoria airport. Now 65, Dyck is mostly retired, and spends considerable time on 11024/C-FUAW.

Dyck is eventually hoping to find financial partners who can help with the cost and maybe find a permanent home.

“This has turned into a full-time job looking after this old girl,” he said.

“I said to a friend: ‘I’m looking for a partner,’” Dyck said. “My friend turned around and said: ‘Yeah, I bet you are.’”

For more information on RCAF 11024 and how to support the project, go online to pbycatalina.com.

rwatts@timescolonist.com