The Christmas Rush

I guess, seeing as I have no new flying stories to share, I can share some older ones. The week or two before Christmas is always a crazy time in the aviation industry. When I was working the ramp back in Kelowna, it was always chaos. It's a combination of lots of passengers, each with extra baggage, topped of with the kind of crazy weather that tends to cancel or delay flights. It was kind of interesting to see how the same chaos existed up here in Thompson. Normally, because the communities we fly to are remote and have limited amenities, passengers fly into Thompson with a small backpack, and leave with upwards of 300lbs of groceries and supplies. At Christmas time, they come into town to do all their Christmas shopping. So they're looking to head back with gifts, groceries for holiday dinners, all sorts of crap.

Normally, on a Saturday, we might send a single plane, maybe a 1900, or maybe a Caravan, on our combined sched of Lac Brochet and Brochet. On this day, Saturday the 18th of December, I think we sent a 1900, a Bandit and two Caravans, one with only cargo, on the Lac Brochet - Brochet route, and then we sent one Caravan just to Brochet filled with over 2000lbs of cargo. The terminal prior to departure was crazy.

I happened to be one of the Caravans going to Lac Brochet and Brochet. I had 5 passengers, four in the back, one upfront with me, and the left hand side of the airplane filled with cargo. All in all it was a great flight, pretty cold, but a gorgeous day. On the flight back, both myself and another caravan were empty, so we had the opportunity to get some photos.



C-FSKS