Report: New Canadian War Museum

[mrhenniger]

I took a vacation day yesterday and briefly visited the new War Museum in Ottawa. If you took your time you could spend two days in the place trying to absorb it all. I give the building a 10 out of 10 and the same goes for the arrangement of the displays. It is obvious much work went into the planning and arrangements of the displays and the hard works shows.

As for aviation... the Nieuport, Spitifire Mk II and the CH-136 Kiowa were transferred from the old museum to the new museum. All are displayed above the walking areas for the visitors, which is a nice change from the "ground" level displays in the previous museum. In addition there is a CF-5, CAF s/n 116702 on display which surprised me. I didn't know they had added a CF-5 to their collection. Of course I knew they had received the CF-101 Voodoo from Lindsay. It is pylon mounted into the structure where the engines would have been. It doesn't look like work has been completed on this airframe, but it looks much better than it did in Lindsay. They also have some remains of CC-115 Buffalo CAF s/n 115461. This was a Buffalo that was operating with NATO during peace keeping operations when it was shot down and destroyed. The few pieces are on display in their peace keeping gallery.

Of course for the fans of armour this is THE PLACE to visit. Their Lebretton Gallery (along with displays in other gallerys) have an amazing collection of vehicles.

But the real surpriese... and Cees will like this... was the display of about 10 nose art panels from Halifax bombers! I knew they had these panels in their collection, but I didn't know that they were planning to display them.

Of course I got photos. I will post on Webshots as soon as I can, but probably not until next week.

Regards,

Mike

Last edited by mrhenniger on Mon May 16, 2005 11:32 am, edited 1 time in total.

[Andrew Semon]

Mike,

Does the CF-5, CAF s/n 116702 appear to be a restored example?

Andrew

[mrhenniger]

Does the CF-5, CAF s/n 116702 appear to be a restored example?

No. I appears that very little work was done if anything at all. It is "authentic".

Mike

P.S. Pics to follow soon.

[Ollie]

Too bad I couldn't make it last Saturday...

Mike, any chance we could set up another meeting soon?

[mrhenniger]

The Friday July 1st might work. Steve T. expressed interest in coming up that weekend. The open house at the museum is always good.

Mike

[Ollie]

Oh, I'll be in the UK then, going to Waddington and Old Warden over the week-end.



I could drop by to hook up with you though, before June the 15th.

[Andrew Semon]

Look forward to seeing the collection at the new museum...glad to see another Canadian CF-5 indoors.

My fav is the one stored at CAM in Ottawa in the "Aggressor Squadron" paint scheme designed to mimic Soviet camouflage styles when the Aircraft is used as "enemy force" during air combat...

[mrhenniger]

I have posted my pics taken at the Canadian War Museum. You can find them at...
http://community.webshots.com/album/547436841nRKLHs/1

I am working on identifying the airframe displayed at floor level near the Nieuport. Also I don't have a serial number of the airframes the nose art panels came from. They are we removed from Halifax bombers before they were scrapped. I have been given a name of a staff member at the museum and phone number. Hopefully I will have more info in the future.

I also ask your forgiveness in advance. I am not at all happy with my CF-101 pics of 101002. I need to redo those. Also a few of the nose art pics didn't turn out well either.

Regards,

Mike

Last edited by mrhenniger on Mon Mar 06, 2006 2:51 pm, edited 1 time in total.

[AirJimL2]

I am working on identifying the airframe displayed at floor level near the Nieuport.

Thanks for the pics. Were any of the V-1s on display?

Is that Barker's Snipe?

Jim

[Andrew Semon]

It looks like CF-5 has been just removed for storage,,,,kind interesting actually...do you think she was moved from Mountainview or did the museum have this one in deep storage?

I take it that it is kinda challenging to photo due to the in the air displays...but thanks for sharing.

Andrew

[mrhenniger]

Thanks for the pics.

You are welcome.

Were any of the V-1s on display?

I wasn't even aware they had any V-1s! Cool. If I had seen one it would have been all around it with my camera. I'll see what I can find out.

Is that Barker's Snipe?

Good question. I think you are talking about the one I don't have an ID for yet. There wasn't much to it (as you can see), and I am not good with the WWI stuff anyway. I'll post here when I know more.

Mike

[AirJimL2]

I wasn't even aware they had any V-1s! Cool. If I had seen one it would have been all around it with my camera. I'll see what I can find out.

I've seen pics of one or two manned V-1s in storage at Vimy House.

Is that Barker's Snipe?

Good question. I think you are talking about the one I don't have an ID for yet. There wasn't much to it (as you can see), and I am not good with the WWI stuff anyway. I'll post here when I know more.

Mike

Yea the unknown ID. I thought I heard someone in Canada was purported to have parts of Barkers VC winning Snipe. That sort of looks like a Snipe to me.

Jim

[mrhenniger]

I've seen pics of one or two manned V-1s in storage at Vimy House.

Hmmm.... In the past they have allowed visitors at Vimy House (the War Museum's warehouse), and usually in the summer. I will look for a chance to visit Vimy House this summer.

Mike

[Steve T]

Mike/Jim/Ollie et al--

CAAA group toured the new CWM (architecture by Hamilton's own Raymond Moriyama BTW) on Sunday morning. That day they were suffering a major electrical glitch that caused about half the building's internal lighting to be off, so my impression of the place was somewhat incomplete! Taking the bad with the good...

--the building itself is splendid (and the architectural press agrees...even the New York Times was lauding Mr Moriyama's work the other week)

--some of the exhibits (and, apparently, parts of the electrical system!) seem to have been rushed in order to get the museum open in time for the VE Day anniversary

--the poor Spitfire (rare Mk.IIb P8332) is all but invisible; seen from starboard she seems to have crashed onto the roof of a row of shops, seen from port she's crashed through a drive-in movie screen! However she is at least present in full in the new building; when on Sussex Drive she'd been minus her starboard wing...and backdropped by this mural about which the less said the better. And admittedly the lights were mostly out where the Spit was on Sunday. The 1945 footage shown on the screen next to the Spit is terrific, Spits from various Canadian units, and with decently-recorded Merlin sound to boot.

--conversely, the F-5 (a recon version, in test aircraft markings) is also crammed up into the rafters, but thus displayed creates a kind of vaguely menacing "canopy" over that part of the Cold War gallery. I found that effective.

--the fuselage near the Nieuport is (purportedly, at least, and in this case probably correctly so) from William Barker's Snipe in which he had his famous epic dogfight near the end of World War I.

--the Halifax nose art is hauntingly displayed fairly high up on a sloping concrete wall near the top of the ramp down to the LeBreton Gallery where all the AFVs (and the Voodoo) are.

--Mike--I forgot to mention before that CAvM isn't doing much for July 1 this year; too much else going on with the new hangar. I'm sure they'll have at least a scaled-back event though.

--Andrew--there's another aggressor-liveried CF-5 at the Carlaw collection, albeit not quite complete. I agree, that's a very cool scheme.

Cheers

S.

[Andrew Semon]

Steve,

Regarding the Carlaw CF-5 I remember seeing one at his place a few yrs back and it was just a fuselage wrapped in a blue tarp..is that pretty much the same condition is might be in now?