Latest news with #GulfOfStLawrence
CBC
03-08-2025
- General
- CBC
Ceremony held for RCAF pilot killed in Cape Breton crash while training in 1944
According to his Royal Canadian Air Force service records, 21-year-old Pilot Officer Bill Bennet was a fine airman. Described as tall and wiry, his commanding officer noted in March 1944 that the Montreal man was also "enthusiastic and intelligent." And as the Second World War in Europe entered its final phase that summer, Bennet was made a staff pilot at the RCAF station in Summerside, P.E.I., where he started training to fly reconnaissance aircraft or bombers. On Aug. 6, 1944, Bennet was tasked with flying a twin-engine Avro Anson V training aircraft carrying two navigators and one radio operator. Their routine mission that Sunday was to fly east from Summerside to a point over the Gulf of St. Lawrence north of Cape Breton and then return. But something went wrong over the water. The aircraft was well south of where it should have been. As it entered a thick bank of fog, Bennet began a descent that he hoped would bring the plane below the haze. Instead of emerging above the vast gulf, the aircraft suddenly plowed through a stand of small trees. Its wings, tail and one engine were torn off as it slammed into the side of Jerome Mountain on the western edge of Cape Breton Highlands National Park. Bennet was badly injured, having suffered a fractured skull. Incredibly, the other three men had only minor wounds. The rescue effort Given the steep, boggy terrain, it wasn't until the next afternoon that a search party reached the remote crash site northeast of the Acadian community of Chéticamp, N.S. The volunteer searchers, most of them local men from the fishing village, were told Bennet had died during the night. With the help of their rescuers, the three survivors — 20-year-old navigator John Robert Ogilvie and 22-year-old navigator William John Astle, both of Edmonton, and 22-year-old communications officer Jack Roy Burke of Wallaceburg, Ont. — managed to hike down the mountain by late Monday. But it would take another day before Bennet's body could be recovered. A local doctor and a member of the military stayed with Bennet's corpse through the night. Jeff Noakes, Second World War historian at the Canadian War Museum in Ottawa, said an RCAF inquiry later found the plane's compass wasn't working properly. As well, he said investigators determined the navigators and the pilot weren't communicating as well as they should have been. "The RCAF ultimately concluded that they weren't 100 per cent sure why there was an error in the navigation," Noakes said in an interview. Saturday ceremony On Saturday, more than 80 years after the crash, a non-profit group based in Chéticamp — Les Amis du Plein Air — held a public ceremony to unveil two commemorative panels at a campsite in the shadow of the mountain. One panel is dedicated to the aircrew, the other to the local men sent to rescue them. Among those in the crowd of about 50 people was one of Bennet's nephews, 63-year-old Bill Bennet of Ottawa, who was named after his late uncle. He said it was important for him and his two children, Liam and Nora, to travel to Cape Breton to be part of the unveiling. "My son is 21," Bill Bennet said, his voice cracking with emotion as he recalled his uncle was the same age when he died. "I want to make them aware of our family's connection to the war and what that means. It's also a chance to connect with the people of Chéticamp about the efforts [their ancestors] made to rescue these men in this very rugged terrain. I think of the sacrifice of my uncle, but there are so many more people involved in this whole story." British Commonwealth Air Training Program Bill Bennet's 65-year-old brother Doug, who travelled from Toronto with his wife Nancy and their children Nathan and Eliza, said his uncle's tragic story illustrates the sacrifices made by those who took part in the British Commonwealth Air Training Program, often described as among Canada's most important contributions to the war effort. By the end of the war, the program had graduated more than 131,000 pilots, observers, flight engineers and other aircrew for the air forces of Canada, Britain, Australia and New Zealand. More than half joined the RCAF. It was often dangerous work. In all, 856 trainees were killed, though some sources suggest the number is much higher. "It was a huge cost," Doug Bennet said before the ceremony began. "And they were almost all in their late teens and early 20s." Erin Gregory, curator at the Canadian Aviation and Space Museum in Ottawa, said most Canadians are more familiar with the sacrifices made overseas during the Second World War. "It's important to mark this moment of service and sacrifice at home, which is at least as important as what happened overseas," Gregory said. "As part of the war effort, it was extremely important and it was dangerous."
CBC
15-07-2025
- Science
- CBC
UNB researchers help filmmakers get closeup view of endangered whales
Social Sharing Two University of New Brunswick researchers are preparing for another cruise into the Gulf of St. Lawrence this week to study endangered North Atlantic right whales. And the timing just happens to correspond with the release of an Apple TV+ documentary series featuring six of the world's most endangered animals. Kim Davies, an associate professor in biological sciences, had a hand in the episode on right whales. "This production we did last year was the largest one I've ever been involved with," Davies said. The Wild Ones has episodes dedicated to Malayan tigers, Gobi bears, Javan rhinos, Caucasian leopards, western lowland gorillas, and North Atlantic right whales. The series, from U.K.-based production company Offspring Films, was released on July 11. Davies runs a research program on the right whales that inhabit New Brunswick waters in spring, summer and fall. Currently, only about 350 North Atlantic right whales are left, with even fewer reproducing females, Davies said, and the population is well below the target for recovery. Davies said the team goes out every year to do various research projects, and recently, started using new technology to tag the whales using drones. The drones will fly over a whale and drop the tag, which will suction to the whale, she said. The tags have cameras on them, allowing for underwater footage. The film crew of The Wild Ones attended last summer's cruise, filming from its own boat and then joining the researchers on Davies's boat during the tagging to capture the underwater perspective. "Any underwater footage that you see from the perspective of the whale in the documentary will be our research program's contribution to the work," she said. New docuseries episode assisted by N.B. right whale researchers 34 minutes ago Duration 1:42 Researchers from the University of New Brunswick and Dalhousie University had a hand in a new Apple TV+ documentary series that delves into the world's most dangerous animals. The researchers helped filmmakers get a closeup look at the North Atlantic right whale. UNB, Dalhousie University and Ocean Alliance researchers were in charge of putting the cameras on the whales for the underwater footage. Davies said the Canadian Whale Institute and Fisheries and Oceans Canada also played a role in the production. Jillian Carter, a UNB graduate student, was on board last summer doing her own research on what right whales are eating. "In order to protect the right whales, we need to know where they're going to be and where they usually are is linked to what they're eating in the summertime," Carter said. She said right whales eat small marine crustaceans called copepods, which are smaller than a grain of rice. While Carter wasn't directly involved with the tagging research or filmmaking, she said the experience itself was surreal. "It has been a lifelong dream of mine to work on boats like this, and then to have an Apple TV+ film crew come aboard, it's kind of like, 'Wow. I can't believe this is real life.'" Davies said the underwater footage was helpful for the TV crew, but it's also important to scientists to answer fundamental questions about how the whale behaves and uses its environment. And she said researchers still have questions about how right whales become entangled in fishing gear underwater. While they have yet to observe an underwater entanglement with a tagged whale, she said, if they keep tagging, they might eventually observe it and learn more about how entanglements happen. Although Davies has worked with other film crews in the past on right whale documentaries, having an episode decided to the whale on a streaming service with the international reach of Apple TV+ will likely have a positive effect, she said.
CBC
10-07-2025
- Science
- CBC
RAW VIDEO: The basking shark that Don Gauthier spotted off P.E.I.'s North Shore
People out in a boat off Prince Edward Island's North Shore react to seeing a large basking shark emerging from the cold waters of the Gulf of St. Lawrence.
Washington Post
03-07-2025
- Politics
- Washington Post
Canada to take steps to protect vanishing North Atlantic right whales from ships
The Canadian government says it is taking steps this summer to protect a vanishing species of whale from lethal collisions with ships in its waters. The whale is the North Atlantic right whale , which numbers only about 370. The whales give birth off the southeastern U.S. in the winter and spring and migrate north to New England and Canada to feed. Along the way, the whales face dangers including ship strikes and entanglement in commercial fishing gear. Environmental groups have long faulted the U.S. and Canadian governments for not doing enough to protect the critically endangered animals. Canada is enforcing mandatory protection measures for the whale this summer, Transport Canada said in a June 27 statement. All vessels of 42.7 feet (13 meters) in length or more must comply with speed restrictions in designated areas of the ocean to avoid whale strikes, the agency said. Transport Canada said it is also requesting voluntary slowdowns in other parts of the ocean. The restrictions reflect the agency's commitment 'to the protection and conservation of endangered North Atlantic right whales,' the agency said. 'Transport Canada has been taking action to help protect this iconic species from vessel collisions in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, a high-traffic area where right whales are often seen,' the statement said. The restrictions are being enforced at a time when scientists are voicing concern about a lack of right whale reproduction . The New England Aquarium in Boston said earlier this year that this year's calving season produced only 11 mother-calf pairs. U.S. government authorities have said the whales need to have at least 50 calves per season to start recovering the population. The U.S. government decided earlier this year to withdraw a proposal that would have required more ships to slow down in East Coast waters to spare the whale. The move came in the final days of President Joe Biden's administration and federal ocean managers said there was no way to implement the rules before President Donald Trump took office in January. The whale was once abundant off the East Coast, but it was decimated long ago during the commercial whaling era. It has been protected by the U.S. Endangered Species Act for decades, but has been slow to recover.
The Independent
03-07-2025
- Politics
- The Independent
Canada to take steps to protect vanishing North Atlantic right whales from ships
The Canadian government says it is taking steps this summer to protect a vanishing species of whale from lethal collisions with ships in its waters. The whale is the North Atlantic right whale, which numbers only about 370. The whales give birth off the southeastern U.S. in the winter and spring and migrate north to New England and Canada to feed. Along the way, the whales face dangers including ship strikes and entanglement in commercial fishing gear. Environmental groups have long faulted the U.S. and Canadian governments for not doing enough to protect the critically endangered animals. Canada is enforcing mandatory protection measures for the whale this summer, Transport Canada said in a June 27 statement. All vessels of 42.7 feet (13 meters) in length or more must comply with speed restrictions in designated areas of the ocean to avoid whale strikes, the agency said. Transport Canada said it is also requesting voluntary slowdowns in other parts of the ocean. The restrictions reflect the agency's commitment 'to the protection and conservation of endangered North Atlantic right whales,' the agency said. 'Transport Canada has been taking action to help protect this iconic species from vessel collisions in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, a high-traffic area where right whales are often seen,' the statement said. The restrictions are being enforced at a time when scientists are voicing concern about a lack of right whale reproduction. The New England Aquarium in Boston said earlier this year that this year's calving season produced only 11 mother-calf pairs. U.S. government authorities have said the whales need to have at least 50 calves per season to start recovering the population. The U.S. government decided earlier this year to withdraw a proposal that would have required more ships to slow down in East Coast waters to spare the whale. The move came in the final days of President Joe Biden 's administration and federal ocean managers said there was no way to implement the rules before President Donald Trump took office in January. The whale was once abundant off the East Coast, but it was decimated long ago during the commercial whaling era. It has been protected by the U.S. Endangered Species Act for decades, but has been slow to recover.
