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The Royal Canadian Air Force’s aerial photography and mapping, a staple of operations from 1921 to 1939, was suspended during the Second World War, except where it would have direct mili­tary bearing, i.e. airfield construction. However, by 1944 the RCAF was performing limited photo survey work for federal and provincial governments, charging them $3.25 per square mile covered.

No. 7 Photo Wing was organized on May 29, 1944, at Rockcliffe (in Ottawa), to conduct photographic operations in Canada and to experiment—within the context of domestic aerial photography—with the combat techniques learned overseas. The unit began with an array of aircraft […]

Aerial photography changed dramatically during World War II, but even before the war an expatriate Australian named Sydney Cotton, had—with the encouragement of the Royal Air Force—begun to explore the possibilities of marrying cameras to high-speed aircraft.

An inventor and aviation pioneer, Cotton had barnstormed in Newfound­land from 1919 to 1922 before moving on to Britain. His earliest experiments, conducted in peacetime, used modern transport aircraft like the Lockheed 12A. Camera lenses tended to frost over at high altitude and so he directed cabin air onto the cameras to solve the problem. When greater range was needed he fitted his […]

Almost from the moment the camera was invented, men sought to take it aloft. The first aerial photograph—taken from a balloon over Paris—was made in 1858. Armies investigated the new technology, and in 1883 Captain Henry Esdale, Royal Engineers, photographed the Halifax Citadel from an unmanned balloon tethered 1,450 feet above the site—the first aerial photograph taken in Canada.

The limitations of balloons as camera platforms were evident. If tethered they overlooked a limited area. If set free they traversed an unpredictable track. The development of the airplane solved the problem by allowing the camera to roam or follow a […]

Historian Owen Cooke identified three levels at which a country interferes militarily in another nation’s conflicts. The first involves military advisers and technical experts who support one side in a civil war. Next come units of foreign “volunteers” operating […]

Recent events in Afghanistan have acquainted Canadians with the expression “friendly fire.” The term–denoting deadly fire from what should be a friendly source–may be relatively new, yet cases of mistaken […]

An article in the May/June issue described the adventures of aircrew who evaded capture after being shot down over enemy territory. In those situations, air force personnel often had an advantage over soldiers in that–having force-landed or bailed […]

The Great Escape has become almost an advertising cliché, from vacation planning to retirement programs. In spite of such modern obfuscation, the original Great Escape remains one of the most famous events of World War II.

Capping a two-year project, 76 British, Commonwealth and Allied […]

Some of the most dramatic adventures of World War II involved evading capture or escaping from enemy detention. Royal Canadian Air Force personnel featured prominently in many of those events, and so this story and the next two will focus on evaders and […]

Royal Canadian Air Force transport came of age during World War II. That war also witnessed a revolution in transoceanic flying. Although the RCAF broke little new ground in this field, it was an active participant through the Royal Air Force’s […]

A look around the globe confirms that systematic and scheduled air transport in this country lagged far behind that of other countries. The United States had a network of transcontinental airlines by 1932. Notwithstanding the establishment of Trans-Canada […]