WESTLOCK – Scott Holmes races airplanes all over the world, with his home base at the Villeneuve Airport just west of Edmonton.
“We design, build, and test racing airplanes, which is nothing to do with what we did on the weekend.”
Holmes heads up Outlaw Air Racing, and has competed three times in the annual Reno Air Races in Reno, Nevada and has also competed in races in China and Thailand. Currently, his team is working on converting his red and white Cassutt race plane to operate with an electric motor and hopes to race this plane in 2021 in Air Race E, the world’s rst all-electric airplane race during which he hopes eight planes will y around a 1.5-kilometre-wide oval circuit just 10 metres above ground while travelling about 400 km/h.
Although air race flying is his passion, and totally different from the Edmonton Area Air Tour held Aug 8. Holmes says the original idea of the tour was to fly around to local airports around the Edmonton area to raise awareness of the local aviation community and to elevate the pilot recurrency training.
He explained every two years Transport Canada mandates pilots do some kind of currency training to keep their skills current.
Airports chosen to land in were chosen as places where the runways were long enough and room for the pilots to park their planes for a short time to allow plane enthusiasts the opportunity to view the planes and chat with the pilots.
Holmes said the counter-clockwise route was chosen in hopes of affecting the most people and still be yable in a day at about 100 knots.
“Storms generally build in the west and migrate east during the day,” he noted. With that in mind, the aircraft, about 25 in total (Holmes didn’t get an exact count) included a twin engine plane, a small two-place helicopter and a variety of single-engine planes. The largest was an Air Tractor from Bonnyville, and started from the Villeneuve airport around 8:30 a.m.
From there, they flew to Drayton Valley, where a large crowd met them. From Drayton Valley, they flew eastward to Camrose Airport, with some of the planes doing a bit of formation flying along the way.
At Camrose, another large crowd was on hand, and Camrose MLA Jackie Lovely, as well as the Camrose mayor and county reeve both spoke, welcoming the pilots and crowd.
The planes then flew north to the Josephburg Airport, where they were greeted by a smaller crowd. Pilots and their ride-alongs were all treated to a box lunch.
Continuing north, the next stop was at Westlock Airport, where they were again greeted by a fairly large crowd of airplane enthusiasts. Speakers at this stop welcoming pilots and guests included Westlock Flying Club’s Mike Breitkreuz, Westlock County Div. 1 County Councillor Victor Julyan, Athabasca-Barrhead-Westlock MLA Glenn van Dijken, Lac Ste Anne-Parkland MLA Shane Getson (who also is a pilot and flew the tour) and Outlaw Air Racing leader and tour organizer Scott Holmes.
By the time the planes flew into Westlock, the weather had begun to deteriorate, and some pilots had already turned back.
Following the Westlock stop, a few more of the remaining pilots returned directly to the Villeneuve Airport, while a few carried on to Barrhead and Mayerthorpe Airports.
All in all, Holmes said later, he felt the Edmonton Area Air Tour was an overall success.
