Plane Vane = Yukon Ingenuity
Flying Club
The Yukon Flying Club was the precursor to the Yukon Transportation Museum. In 1977, these dedicated individuals with a passion for Yukon aviation embarked on a four-year volunteer project to create one of Whitehorse’s most recognizable landmarks.
The club devised a plan to restore a DC-3 aircraft, CF-CPY, to her original 1950s vintage Canadian Pacific Airlines colours. They also had to figure out how to safely mount her to a base. A local welder conceived the idea to have CPY pivot on her pedestal, working with the inevitable Whitehorse wind rather than against it.
In 1981, CF-CPY was mounted on her pedestal in front of the Whitehorse Airport. Here she greeted locals, visitors and curious passers-by, her nose always pointing into the wind with the slightest of breezes.
As an outdoor monument, CPY faced the harsh extremes of Yukon weather on a daily basis. Her age started to show with faded colours and peeling paint. In 1998, CPY was removed from her pedestal for some restoration work. Once again, a dedicated volunteer labour force banded together to return her to her true glory. In September 2001, CPY was remounted onto her pedestal, showing off her new paint job and hand-polished exterior to the admiring public.
With expansions planned for the newly named Erik Nielsen Whitehorse International Airport, CF-CPY was again removed from her pedestal in July 2009. Gingerly placed on the ground and her pedestal dismantled and reassembled in front of the Yukon Transportation Museum, she was once more hoisted in the air to pivot in the wind.
If you did not catch the internationally acclaimed CPY Yarn Bomb project while it was on display in August 2012, see the pictures and videos at:
2023-25 Maintenance Project – 100 Years of Yukon Aviation History
In 2020, the Yukon Transportation Museum celebrated 100 years of aviation history in the Yukon. The Canadian Pacific Airlines DC-3 outside the museum is part of that storied history, and as part of our celebrations over the past few years, we have been conducting a maintenance project on her. Our goals are many, but mainly we wish to maintain the pedestal, repaint the exterior, repair CPY’s ailerons, and to install more benches underneath her wings.
As of the time of this writing, we have accomplished several of the tasks that we set out to do, but there are always more repairs around the corner. Frankly, a project of this magnitude could never be possible without the support of our museum community. If you’d like to donate financially to this everlasting endeavor, click the link below.
If you’re a mechanic or a pilot who would rather donate time and talent to the cause, send us an email at info@goYTM.ca.
