Fanshawe College has a new teaching tool in its aerospace school arsenal, one that will give aviation students one of a kind hands-on experience.
A de Havilland Dash 7 turboprop-powered plane made its final flight Monday, landing at the London International Airport where it is being decommissioned and donated to the college's Norton Wolf School of Aviation Technology.
The 30-year-old aircraft, which has flown in and out of war zones on United Nations relief missions, received a ceremonial water-cannon salute celebrating its final flight as it taxied to the Fanshawe hangar.
"Students being able to have experience on an aircraft like this, of this nature, size , complexity, and completeness will create aircraft maintenance engineers coming out of southwestern Ontario that are going to be far more experienced than most other college graduates across all of Canada. This is an amazing opportunity, not just for Fanshawe but for Ontario," said Steven Patterson, chairman of the Norton Wolf School of Aviation Technology.
The college's 240 avionics and maintenance students will use the Dash 7 in a variety of classroom exercises, all of which will prepare them for real world jobs in the industry.
"They will do everything from running the engines, doing the systems, the hydraulics, and fuel checks, which isn't done unilaterally across the province for aircraft maintenance engineer training," said Patterson. "So students get running aircraft which is a novelty... They will be able to taxi, run it, start it, tear it down, put the props on and off, and frankly a lot of them will fall in love with it too."
The Dash 7 was donated by Trans Capital Air Ltd., a Toronto-based charter airline that operates transport services for the UN on peacekeeping and relief missions.
"When I came down and saw just what the school was doing, how well resourced it was, and how focused it was on providing hands-on experience to its students - which really is the most valuable thing for businesses looking to hire people - that was motivating for me," said Antoine Pappalardo, president and co-owner of Trans Capital Air. "I figured I had to be a part of it and the opportunity to support that with a hands-on learning tool that's an example of Canadian technology and heritage, I figured it would be a perfect match."
The Dash 7 brings Fanshawe's growing fleet of instructional aircraft up to 19.