A high flying trip to retirement
The final flight of a storied aircraft sparks treasured memories
It may be odd to think of a military aircraft as a part of the family, but that’s the case for me and the Martin JRM Mars cargo transport flying boat.
Yesterday, the sole surviving WWII behemoth took its final flight, landing in calm water off Vancouver Island near the museum that will be its final resting place.
A lengthy description of this flying boat is available on Wikipedia — but suffice to say, only seven were ever built, and for a variety of reasons the survivors of this group have been a fixture in my life over nearly 70 years.
Five production aircraft (the Marianas Mars, Philippine Mars, Marshall Mars, Caroline Mars, and a second Hawaii Mars) entered service ferrying cargo to Hawaii and other Pacific Islands in January 1944. The Marshall Mars, was lost to a fire near Hawaii in 1950, leaving the four with which I became familiar.
In 1955, the west coast branch of the British-owned Fairey Aviation Company of Canada Limited was formed in 1955 in North Saanich, just north of the provincial capital of Victoria on Vancouver Island. My father, retired from the Canadian Air Force, snagged a job at their hanger at Patricia Bay Airport (now, Victoria International Airport).
