These images recently emerged on Facebook: August and September, 1944 issues of the CP Air Repair Rambler. Featuring a test flight of the Canso taking flight over New Westminster, likely emerging from the Queensborough CP Air Overhaul Plant.
Crew photos captioned...CPA Overhaul Plant, Pre-Flight Crew, 1944, New Westminster, BC - 01 - Photographer Unknown.
The plane is of course, either a Canso or Catalina, the type of amphibious planes built at Boeing Vancouver. Here's a brief history of the airframe:
Issued to CPAL (#13 AID) for repairs 19Jun44; ferried from Coal Harbour to Jericho Beach 20Jun44 [last time recorded in 6 (BR) Sqn’s ORB]; to WAC (SR) on completion 12Aug44 [RCAF card].
Jerry Vernon writes about plane and the CPA facility:
I can't tell for sure if it is a Canso A or a Catalina, but perhaps there is some outline of the nosegear doors visible, so it would be a Canso A. The RCAF did have a handful of straight flying boat Cansos (not amphibians) plus a bunch of Catalinas that came from the RAF as repayment for the aircraft that the RCAF had provided to them earlier when the RAF was in dire need of patrol aircraft to combat the U-Boats in the North Atlantic.
The RCAF had ordered 50 aircraft directly from Consolidated Aircraft in San Diego before the production facilities were set up for Canso As at Boeing Aircraft of Canada and at Canadian Vickers in Montreal. 36 were Cansos and the last 14 were Canso As. The RAF were given 29 of the Canso flying boats and the RCAF were repaid later when the RAF's own orders for Catalinas were filled. They went on the RCAF records as Catalinas, not as Cansos. The actual number of ex-RAF Catalinas in the RCAF is 30, as one aircraft was swapped out later.
Boeing Overhaul was set up in one of the hangars at Sea Island...the old hangar that is still there on the river, now used by Pacific Coastal Airlines. It used to be the TCA hangar and later the PWA hangar. They did overhauls on RCAF and TCA aircraft (Lockheed 10s and 12s).
On 01 May 42, Boeing Overhaul was taken over by CP and transferred to Canadian Pacific Airlines Overhaul, later known as CPA (Repair). They did overhaul and repair work on all of the metal aircraft types, from Kittyhawks to Hampdens, Mitchells, Cansos, Catalinas, Liberators, etc., while Coates Ltd., in a small hangar that is now gone, did overhaul and repair work on fabric aircraft such as Tiger Moths, Lysanders, Norsemen, Hurricanes, etc.
The Queensborough plant was built as a diversification sort of thing in case YVR might be attacked and bombed. Seaplanes and amphibians could be landed right there and brought up the ramp but all landplanes had to be barged there from YVR, the same as some were also barged around to No. 3 Repair Depot at Jericho Beach, as it was almost impossible to break most aircraft types down narrow enough to pass over the old Marpole Bridge. For example, most type of airplanes for the PNE Parade or for an RCAF display at the PNE had to go to Jericho Beach by barge and then be towed on city streets over the Burrard Bridge and down Hastings St. A Golden Hawks Sabre was OK, as the wings come off clean at the fuselage, but a Mustang or Vampire was too messy to do!
The old Queensborough plant is still there, but is divided up into premises for a bunch of small companies, trucking companies, etc. and the yard is used for container storage.
As far as I know, no engine work was done there. British Aero Engines (later Bristol Aero Engines) was located at YVR, sort of where the parking lot is now for the Flying Beaver, adjacent to the Air B. C. hangar.
izzy806
jbbartram-illu
andulkaphoto
snowghoul
2087
dededos
annaxmalina
discoholicmusic