As the flag carrier of Canada and the largest airline based among our neighbors to the north, Air Canada has a rich history that spans over eight decades. It's one of the five founding members of the Star Alliance and is headquartered at Saint-Laurent, Quebec. The airline flies to over 220 destinations across its global network, with a diverse fleet of short, medium, and long-haul aircraft. Air Canada traces its roots back to April 1937 with the formation of Trans-Canada Air Lines (TCA). The company went on to pioneer commercial passenger aviation across Canada throughout the decades and changed its name to Air Canada in 1965. As an international powerhouse, the airline has adapted to the ever-changing conditions of the aviation industry, now serving more than 50 million passengers per year. The carrier also has a surprising number of interesting and respectable innovations to its name that have helped to shape the aviation industry. Let’s take a look at some of them now.
Air Canada was very influential when it came to core systems of aviation safety. Shortly after its founding, between 1939 and 1946, the carrier was one of the first airlines to have its entire fleet of unpressurized aircraft equipped with fixed oxygen systems. These were installed and used by its flight crew and passengers as needed using the “rebreathing bag principle.” These masks had a one-way valve system that prevented exhaled oxygen from mixing with the oxygen in the reservoir bag. When one inhaled, they breathed in oxygen from the reservoir bag. Exhaled air escaped through vents in the side of the mask and went back into the atmosphere. These bags formed the predecessor system for those found on today’s pressurized aircraft that operate at high flight altitudes. I’m referring to those familiar yellow oxygen masks stored in compartments above our seats and near areas like lavatories and galleys. These masks are connected to an oxygen source such as a centralized gaseous cylinder or a decentralized chemical oxygen generator.
Some two decades later, Air Canada participated in the later stages of development for the multi-channel flight recorder. First invented in 1958 by Australian scientist David Warren, Air Canada engineers collaborated in 1965 with Royston Instruments, an English electronics company, to produce the multi-channel flight recorder which we colloquially refer to as the “black box." Air Canada notes that the device was first installed on its Vanguard and DC-8 aircraft. Then Trans-Canada Airlines was the first in the world to put the Vanguard into scheduled service and when they introduced their Douglas DC-8's on transcontinental routes on April 1, 1960 and overseas on June 1 of the same year, they cut flying time by nearly 50 per cent. Since then, the black box flight recorder has been universally adopted as a means to investigate accidents and to prevent their recurrence. The recorder has more than proved itself a significant contribution to international airline safety.
Flight recorders come in two varieties, with each collecting a different kind of data, as implied in their respective names. The flight data recorder keeps track of every instruction made by pilots and sent through the electronic systems to the relevant components. They are located at the rear, where they have the best chances of withstanding a crash.The cockpit voice recorder serves to document not just the voices of the pilots, but also any general noises in their vicinity (such as audible warnings). The Federal Aviation Administration requires they be able to record two hours of audio. These two forms of data often provide vital pieces of information when it comes to piecing together the timeline of a given accident. Such recorders are fitted with locator beacons. Even when submerged under 20,000 feet of water, these devices broadcast their location for up to 30 days which increases their chance of being found. While flight recorders are most commonly known by the name “black box,” this term is, in fact, a misnomer as the devices are actually painted in a bright shade of orange. This coloring makes them far easier to locate amid the devastation normally present at an aircraft crash site.
Experiencing its fair share of frigid temperatures and intense snowstorms, Air Canada found ways to adapt its aircraft to these cold weather conditions. As such it was the first airline to equip its fleet in the 1940s with alcohol de-icing nozzles ahead of the windscreen. Installation began with the Lockheed Super Electra 14H2 and the Lockheed Lodestar 1808A aircraft which allowed for de-icing coverage of the complete windscreens. Air Canada would also be the first in the country to adopt electronic de-icing of aerodynamic surfaces. This appeared with the introduction of the Vickers Vanguard aircraft in 1961. Today, de-icing is a critical maintenance process removing snow, ice, or frost from an aircraft’s surface. Aircraft are designed to fly with clean surfaces, and during colder periods of the year, icy materials can build up, disrupt airflow, and interfere with a safe take-off. If ice forms on the leading edge of an aircraft's wing in flight, it causes the wing to stall at a lower angle of attack and at a higher airspeed. Even a thin layer of ice can have a large effect on wing stall. In many cases, increasing speed is required to maintain level flight.
In the early 1950s the airline industry was undergoing explosive growth. A serious limiting factor was the time taken to make a single booking, which could take upwards of 90 minutes in total. Trans-Canada Air Lines found their bookings typically involved between three and seven calls to their centralized booking office in Toronto, where telephone operators would scan flight status displayed on a huge board showing all scheduled flights one month into the future. Bookings past that time could not be made, nor could an agent reliably know anything other than if the flight was full or not. To book two seats was much more complex, requiring the operator to find the "flight card" for that flight in a filing cabinet. Things have come a long way since then and electronic systems are now one of the more common ways to receive proof that you have a seat booked on a flight. While it wasn't Air Canada specifically that introduced this innovation, it was a Canadian firm that introduced the world’s first computerized reservations system. Designed and manufactured in Canada by Ferranti Canada, this system fostered tremendous growth in computerized and communications airlines processes. Developed for Trans-Canada Air Lines, the ReserVec system's implementation was completed on January 24, 1963, and predates the more famous and ubiquitous SABRE system in the US by roughly two years.
We also take the concept of a single itinerary with multiple airlines for granted today, but this wasn't always possible. It was made much easier with the advent of electronic tickets. Indeed, it was in 2000 that Air Canada and United Airlines introduced the world's first interline electronic ticket. This made airline partnerships much smoother, offering travelers more options to get from one place to another. Four years later in 2004, Air Canada introduced an industry-first: Self-managed online multi-trip flight passes. This would lead to the creation of fixed monthly payment subscription passes for unlimited travel. Then in 2007, Air Canada became the first airline in North America to introduce electronic boarding passes for mobile check-in. Rolled out around the same time as Apple's first iPhone, this allowed customers holding a cellular phone or smartphone to keep their boarding pass on their phone.
Without even discussing Air Canada's founding-member status in the first-ever airline alliance, there can be no doubt that they’ve contributed a great deal to the aviation industry and how passengers now travel the world.
Until next time…safe travels.
Who would have thought that Air Canada would have introduced so many firsts into the airline industry? Well done them!!!
Nice way to highlight the advances Air Canada made to the airline industry. Always interesting to read your synopsis of a subject.
How enlightening!
We have a lot to thank Air Canada for. Their progressive forethought has enriched all of us travelers lives!
Again, thank you George for the insight!
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