Versatility and Strength

LCol Jean Maisonneuve’s 429 Transport Squadron has the smallest—and biggest—fleet in the Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF): the Boeing CC-177 Globemaster III. At four aircraft, the fleet is definitely the smallest in number, but with a wingspan of 170 feet (52 metres) and a maximum payload of 160,000 pounds (72,727 kilograms), the four-engine high-tail strategic airlifter is clearly the heavyweight contender in the RCAF. 

The commanding officer (CO) of 429 Transport Squadron since July 2013, Maisonneuve told his new personnel that it was his “life-long dream job” and he offered this advice to his new team: “work hard, play hard, maintain a sense of humour, and have fun while making a difference.” An avid cyclist, the native of the small Eastern Ontario town of St. Isidore closed off by citing the squadron’s motto, “fortunae nihil” or “nothing to chance.” It’s advice he takes to heart. 

With more than 7,400 hours on the CC-130 Hercules, CC-144 Challenger and the CC-177 Globemaster III aircraft, Maisonneuve has flown basic and advanced tactical airlift, transported heads of state, and in 2001 was one of two Canadians selected to fly the Globemaster on exchange with the U.S. Air Force. During his career, he has served as an instructor, evaluator, and chief pilot. During an RCAF Today visit to Trenton, a simulated tactical combat mission in one of the Globemasters did double duty as a check ride for Maisonneuve himself. 

These days, the apparently self-effacing CO doesn’t get to fly as much as the pilots under his command. “Unfortunately not,” he lamented matter-of-factly. “My priority is to make sure my guys are happy. But, I do still get to fly and it’s still a good day when I’m in the cockpit.” He agreed with a suggestion that it’s important in such a compact unit for the boss to at least remain current. “I think the CO should lead from the front, so yes.” 

 

Nicknamed “Bisons,” with a buffalo profile on its squadron crest, 429 has what Maisonneuve described as “a long and proud history,” having flown a variety of aircraft in its time, beginning as a World War 2 bomber squadron. Stood down twice, it was reactivated to fly the four massive Globemaster IIIs. 

There’s no hiding the squadron’s desire for a fifth aircraft, which the Air Force Association of Canada (AFAC) has urged in a policy paper, but current budget constraints suggest that is on the government’s back burner, at best. Even so, the AFAC says Canada faces air mobility competition in the Arctic from Russia and other northern nations, so more strategic airlift capacity only makes sense. 

But there’s the question of where the RCAF might acquire that added capacity. Perhaps second-hand from the U.S. Air Force’s large and often under-used C-17 fleet? The USAF wanted only 190 of the type, but pressure in Congress boosted the total to 224. Worldwide annual deliveries of the highly-capable but expensive aircraft have never been huge, peaking at 16 in 2002 through 2009 before beginning to fall off. Boeing is now scheduled to shut down its Long Beach, Calif., production line in a year. 

The RCAF’s Globemasters are the end result of a Future Strategic Airlifter Project. In June 2006, five months after forming their first government, the Conservatives fulfilled a campaign promise to acquire three or four aircraft. The new defence minister at the time, Gordon O’Connor, a retired Army BGen who has since left politics, announced that the government would negotiate directly with Boeing for four aircraft at a projected cost of $1.8 billion, including some training and service support. The cost of the aircraft alone was not disclosed, but the USAF website prices them at $202.3 million in 1998 U.S. dollars. A contract followed in February 2007; and, as in a Royal Australian Air Force deal, the airframes were from a run originally destined for the USAF. 

The first Canadian CC-177 made its debut at the Abbotsford International Airshow in British Columbia on Aug. 11, 2007, and then barely made it to its new home in Trenton, Ont., before it was assigned its first mission. That was the delivery of 30 tonnes of emergency relief supplies to Jamaica in the wake of Hurricane Dean on Aug. 23, 2007. The second aircraft arrived in Trenton a couple of months later, and the  

last two in October 2008. 

More recently, the Squadron’s CC-177s were deployed twice to Africa last year, including for what Prime Minister Stephen Harper described as “limited and clearly-defined logistical support” for French troops who were backing Malian forces’ campaign against Islamist militants in the country’s northern half. 

That was followed by Exercise Flintlock 13, where a CC-177 was used to transport Bell CH-146 Griffons from 427 Special Operations Aviation Squadron in Petawawa, Ont. Their initial destination was Niger, where the helicopters supported Canadian Special Operations Regiment (CSOR) troops who were providing reconnaissance, navigation, marksmanship and other basic training to that country’s military. They then moved to Mauritania for Flintlock itself, coordinated by the U.S. Africa Command in an effort to build capacity and enhance security and stability in the Western Sahel region. Used only for limited airlift, the Griffons could only have participated with the help of 429 Squadron. 

The RCAF Today visit to Trenton coincided with the squadron’s preparations for two more major deployments: to Operation Boxtop at home and to Cooperación III, a multinational effort in Peru. 

Boxtop is a twice-a-year supply run to Canadian Armed Forces Station Alert, 1,140 miles north of the Arctic Circle and just 508 miles (817 kilometres) from the geographic North Pole. Established in 1950 as an Army weather station but now under the command of 8 Wing Trenton, Alert is an intelligence-gathering outpost which is home to more than two dozen military personnel, as well as a cadre of environmental scientists and a team of private-sector contractors. It used to have as many as 200 personnel at any given time. 

Even with a reduced presence, Alert is sustainable only by air, preferably during the short “warm” season. The service flights used to be done with Lockheed CC-130 turboprops flying out of the U.S. Air Force Base in Thule, Greenland, but the always risky nature of the mission was highlighted by a crash during an approach to Alert in a major snowstorm in November 1991. The Globemaster, which can fly twice as fast as the Hercs, has enabled the RCAF to reduce the frequency of those flights and, hence, the attendant risks. On each trip, the Globemaster can offload about 115,000 pounds of fuel. On a recent mission, a total of 1.4 million pounds of JP-8 fuel was offloaded in Alert, the majority from the CC-177. 

About the same time as preparations for the latest Alert run were ramping up, approximately 60 RCAF crewmembers were getting set to deploy to Cooperación III, which ran from mid-April to early May. It was the first time the RCAF’s AgustaWestland CH-149 Cormorant search and rescue helicopter had been deployed outside of North America, making the trip in the cavernous belly of a Globemaster. It was a successful test of the air transportability of the helicopter in an expeditionary setting, to simulate response to an international crisis. 

Part of the federal government’s global engagement strategy, Canada participates in the exercise as a member of Sistema de Cooperación entre las Fuerzas Aéreas Americanas (SICOFAA), an interamerican airforce project. “This exercise highlights the importance of partnerships and interoperability within SICOFAA,” said RCAF commander, LGen Yvan Blondin. “By conducting air expeditionary training, and practising our humanitarian aid delivery and search and rescue capabilities in this region, the RCAF will be even better prepared should we ever be called upon to assist in the event of a natural disaster.” 

As to the business of combat operations, the CC-177 flew in support of Joint Task Force Afghanistan as part of Operation Athena in Afghanistan from 2007 until the return of the last troops from Op Attention in March 2014. During that time, they conducted regular sustainment flights from Canada with the semi-annual rotation of troops in and out of Afghanistan operating on the air bridge. 

And, how those Globemasters can carry! One CC-177 can haul three CH-146 Griffons with refuelling tanks, or one Leopard 2 main battle tank, or as many as 102 paratroopers. But perhaps most useful is its long legs and ability to land in remote airfields. 

Compared with a Hercules, “we can carry a lot more and we can get there a lot faster,” said Capt Sean Bassett, who flew in the right-hand seat as first officer during Maisonneuve’s check ride and simulated combat mission. “It makes a huge difference, and some of the stuff we can fit in the back, you can’t fit in other aircraft.”

 

Bassett, an Ottawa native whose father is ex-RCAF and a “plane fanatic” who used to take him to a lot of airshows as a youngster, is unusual in that he’s a former infantryman who transferred to the RCAF and now is one of a select few who fly its biggest aircraft, having logged some 700 hours so far. His missions have taken him to Afghanistan, Africa, the Arctic, Hawaii and the Philippines, the latter as part of Operation Renaissance, and at the time of an RCAF Today interview, he was preparing for Cooperación III in Peru. 

“I always was kind of fascinated by flying, so I figured I’d give it at shot,” he said. “It’s a pretty cool aircraft. As big as it is, it’s very responsive; I’m very impressed with the engineering behind it and its flight characteristics. It’s a fun aircraft to fly.” And he has experience not shared by most pilots, having done some static-line parachute jumps from CC-130s while still a trooper. “I think I have a good appreciation for how the soldiers rely on air mobility to get them where they’re going and to resupply them.” He even has ferried “a lot of my buddies” to Afghanistan, taking some ribbing about his seemingly newfound reluctance to jump out of perfectly serviceable aircraft. 

The CC-177 Globemaster III requires a crew of only three: pilot, co-pilot and loadmaster, but RCAF practice usually has two loadmasters aboard. Sgt Rich Lees, a native of Springhill, N.S., who has specialized training in airdrops, has been with 429 Squadron since 2008, and has flown only on the CC-177. “I don’t have any of those bad habits or ‘Hercisms’ as we call them,” he laughed. “Apart from the sheer size, there are tons of differences between the Hercs and the Globemasters, a lot of little things.” 

As for the job, while one loadmaster can do it, “it’s organized chaos back here and you can be running around like the proverbial chicken,” Lees said, hence the decision to double up, which reduces the possibility of accidents such as a shifting load. He hasn’t had one, but said he’s always looking for potential problems, especially on missions such as the runs to Afghanistan, when the standard approach is steep and the landing involves heavy braking and tons of reverse thrust. 

“The first thing you’re looking at is those chains because the last thing you want is a load shifting,” he said, explaining that the standard practice is to carry out a detailed check while tying down, checking again before and after takeoff, and yet again before landing. “If you did miss something, which you shouldn’t have, you’ll be able to catch it.” 

Lees was thrown right into the operational deep end when he joined 429 in June 2008. He flew his first mission to Afghanistan in August, and at the end of that month he was deployed there for a month and a half. Returning home, he did another check ride a week later and was back in Afghanistan again. “We’d been averaging at least one flight a month over there. He also flew with Maisonneuve during Operation Renaissance, working alone for a change because of the short notice for the mission.

Like loadmasters in most air forces, RCAF loadmasters can override the flight deck when the need arises. “It doesn’t matter whether you’re the pilot, the co-pilot or the loadmaster; if there’s a safety issue, anybody can yell ‘stop’—and we have.” Loadmasters work in a potentially hazardous environment, especially when the rear ramp is open in flight to do a parachute cargo drop. Each loadmaster is tethered to ensure nobody falls out. “They don’t give us parachutes,” Lees cracked, adding that if anything like that did happen and a crewmember was hanging off the back, there are winches and there likely would be “a lot of adrenalin kicking in.” 

RCAF loadmasters first have to spend time as an “air mover,” the technicians who load aircraft. Once selected for the career upgrade, they are sent to a USAF centre in Oklahoma for three months to learn the “ins and outs” of aircraft, with an emphasis on structural limitations and loading techniques. But the syllabus is designed for “18-year-olds fresh out of high school” so some of the time in Oklahoma is old hat to the Canadians. “A lot of the stuff is second nature to us,” Lees said. 

Maintenance on the CC-177s, given their tasking since 429 Squadron was reactivated, is intensive if the aircraft are to remain available—which is not always the case. Maisonneuve said his maintenance regime is “not quite 24/7” but “pretty close.” Level 1 and 2 maintenance is done in-house by his highly-capable and motivated crews, but heavy Level 3 work is contracted out to Boeing, a procedure that usually takes three to four months every five years or so. 

The Globemaster III was actually developed for the USAF by McDonnell Douglas, which was merged with Boeing in 1997. It is the third generation member of the Globemaster family, carrying forward the name of two earlier piston-engined airlifters built by Douglas Aircraft, which merged with McDonnell Aircraft in 1967. Those were the four-engined C-74 Globemaster, of which only 14 were built at the end of World War II, and the C-124 Globemaster II, which was the USAF’s primary heavy transport in the 1950s and early 1960s, remaining operational with the Air National Guard until 1974.

The Globemaster III is powered by four Pratt & Whitney F117-PW-100 turbofans, based on the commercial PW2040 used on the Boeing 757 passenger jet. Each is rated at 40,400 pounds of thrust. Maisonneuve said they are the only engines capable of idle-reverse thrust in flight, enabling astonishingly rapid descents (up to 20,000 feet per minute at 320 KIAS) in a hostile environment such as Afghanistan. “You’re hanging in your harness from the deceleration forces at 20 degrees nose-down,” he said. 

On the ground, the thrust reversers can direct exhaust upwards and forward. That means that maintainers and other personnel can work behind the aircraft with the engines running. It also reduces the chance of foreign object damage from runway debris, and there’s even enough thrust to back up the aircraft while taxiing. As part of his check ride, Maisonneuve demonstrated this while doing “a three-point turn” at the end of the runway on landing, practice for operating out of narrow strips. 

During the CO’s extensive preflight briefing, paratroopers scheduled for a jump that afternoon opted out when advised that the winds at the drop zone were above safe limits for a practice jump. But the loadmasters went ahead with their rigorous preparations to drop a couple of palletized cargo loads at a simulated Forward Operating Base (FOB). The impressive network of tie-downs was set up so that once a “drop drop” instruction went to Bassett in the cockpit, he could release the pallets remotely, letting them roll off the ramp. 

All the preparatory work done, Maisonneuve was cleared for his flight as “Racer One,” but had to hold while a CC-130J from one of the other 8 Wing squadrons cleared the runway. He then hauled the Globemaster into a steep tactical takeoff before turning north toward the FOB. En route, he responded to radio warnings of small arms fire from the ground and a first-generation shoulder-launch missile, taking quick evasive action which showed off the big aircraft’s manoeuvrability and made for an exhilarating ride in a jumpseat just behind Maisonneuve in the spacious cockpit. 

Before the mission, Maisonneuve and his crew had been advised by a meteorologist not only about the ground-level wind but also “moderate to locally severe” turbulence due to a 50-knot wind at between 2,500 and 3,500 feet.

After three passes over the 6,069 x 1968-foot (1,850 x 600-metre) drop zone, which was surrounded by trees and had a quarry to the north, it was decided that the drop from 550 feet would be scrubbed because of concern about where the loads would land. 

While Maisonneuve and Bassett were up front, Capt Matthew Osgood spent time in the crew rest area behind the cockpit, which has comfortable seats and a couple of relatively Spartan bunks for long missions. Osgood is a young but experienced C-17 pilot on exchange from the USAF, where he logged more than 2,800 hours on the type. 

The native of Easton, Me., a five-minute drive from the New Brunswick border, began his three-year tour with 429 in June 2013 and is the fourth USAF officer to spend time with the squadron. A self-described “C-17 baby” who flew C-17s out of Charleston, S.C., for seven and a half years, he was advised by his squadron commander that time with the RCAF would be a good opportunity. 

“They were looking for an air drop evaluator and I just happened to meet the requirement when it was my turn,” he said. “I was excited because it would sort of get me back home. South Carolina was too hot.” His wife, he admitted, isn’t keen on the cold winters. “It’s a whole different experience, from the USAF rules to the Canadian rules and even the missions that Canadian C-17s do,” he enthused. “You guys have four aircraft and you use them quite extensively. Also, there are neat missions like the one to Alert, and the environment can be a lot more challenging.” 

Osgood cited another seminal difference between the air forces. “We have a ton of aircraft in the USAF and they’re not maintained the way yours are. You have four and they’re a precious resource, while ours are used and abused. The ‘17s we have in Charleston didn’t have as many hours as yours.” 

That said, he considers himself “pretty fortunate” to have gone straight to the C-17 from multi-engine training in the T-1A Jayhawk, a version of the Beech 400A business jet, after basic pilot training in the North American Aviation T-6 Texan. “It’s a leap,” he acknowledged. “But the C-17’s a dream in the air. It’s the only heavy aircraft with a stick and you can’t beat it. . . . It’s good at everything.” 

The RCAF clearly knows that, too.