Gimli Glider Exhibit commemorates 40th anniversary of miracle landing

For Robert Pearson, the sound of applying the brakes to the Boeing 767-200 of Air Canada Flight 143 reverberates nearly 40 years after the aircraft landed in Gimli, Manitoba. The plane made a harrowing emergency landing on July 23, 1983, and all 61 passengers and eight crew aboard the aircraft survived.

Pearson, who turned 88 in early July, recalls the legendary landing of what became known as the Gimli Glider. 

“As soon as we got on the ground, I got on the brakes,” he said in a recent interview from his hobby farm in Alexandria, Ontario. “And as soon as I got on the brakes, the nose hit and sounded like a couple of double-barrelled shotguns going off.” 

Pearson was captain of the flight that departed from Montreal and made a stopover in Ottawa, with Edmonton as the scheduled destination. 

The new aircraft ran out of fuel near the Ontario-Manitoba border. But Pearson, with first officer Maurice Quintal in the right seat, managed to glide the plane for its descent to an abandoned military airstrip in Gimli. He deployed a gliding technique known as the sideslip. 

Pearson retired from Air Canada in 1993. Quintal, who retired from the airline in 2007, died at the age of 68 in 2015. 

Pearson offers a reminder of simpler times, technologically. “No cellphones, you know. It was a different era back then — 1983,” he said. 

The flight never had a chance to make it to Edmonton because of a refueling error on the ground in Montreal that traced back to a metric conversion mistake. Ground crew doing manual calculations vastly misjudged how much fuel would be required for the Boeing 767-200, and it went undetected during the stopover in Ottawa. 

The fabled landing’s history is enshrined at the Gimli Glider Exhibit, which held its grand opening in Gimli in 2017. Besides various artifacts from the Boeing 767-200, the exhibit features a full-scale replica of the flight deck.

Barb Gluck, president of the Gimli Glider Exhibit, said there will be a weekend of activities planned for July 22 to 23 this year, including welcoming Pearson as a special guest to commemorate the 40^th anniversary of the miracle landing.  

On the evening of July 22, there will be a fundraising dinner and dance held in a hangar on the apron of Gimli Airport, located an hour’s drive north of Winnipeg. On the afternoon of July 23, a commemorative plaque is to be installed where the Gimli Glider’s nose came to rest, as part of a public event.  

The aircraft — distinguished by its registration marking, “C-GAUN,” and FIN number, “604” — became a highlight for plane spotters during its 25 years of commercial service, before Air Canada retired it to the Mojave Air and Space Port in California in 2008.

After failed attempts to sell the plane in 2013, operational parts of the Gimli Glider were placed for sale. A group formed by Gluck managed to buy some of the parts, and benefited from donations such as memorabilia. The Gimli Glider Exhibit now houses original artifacts such as the jump seat, the fuel panel from the flight deck, as well as the top portion of the tail. 

Among the other items on display is the same generation of ram air turbine, which played an important role in controlling the powerless plane, said Gluck. 

Over the years, admiration for Pearson’s skill has continued to grow. On the same night that he glided into aviation history, a high school reunion was taking place in a building at the side of a runway — which put things into perspective for many locals, who said “they were so relieved that there were skilled pilots” at the controls of Flight 143, noted Gluck. As well, Winnipeg’s Royal Aviation Museum of Western Canada had a temporary display late last summer to pay tribute to the Gimli Glider.

Pearson’s heroism has even taken on international prominence. The Air League of Monaco, a charity based on the northern coast of the Mediterranean Sea, featured Pearson during a dinner event this past May. The dinner celebrated his “heroic actions in the face of imminent danger,” the Air League said. 

For Pearson, who is a great grandfather, the 40th anniversary of the landing will be a period of reflection and acknowledgement that time is precious. 

He described his own emotional state during the 1983 ordeal as “robotic” and “completely unemotional” because he had to focus on the task at hand. Still, he realized the high stakes when he saw two boys bicycling at the abandoned airstrip in Gimli. A third boy was out of Pearson’s line of sight at the time. They were part of a group that had gathered for go-kart races. Fortunately, the boys pedalled away to safety. 

Today, Pearson stays active with hobbies like golf and curling, and his mind gets a workout when he educates younger generations about the tale of the Gimli Glider. 

“I’ve been telling the story for a long time,” he said. “I’m happy to still be around.”