"Canada 150th" events in Ottawa

[rocketphish]

Dates announced for Red Bull Crashed Ice in Ottawa

By Michelle Nash Baker
Ottawa East News, Oct 13, 2016

Mark your calendar – the dates have been set to determine who in the world is the best at hurling themselves down an ice hill.

Ottawa is set to host the Red Bull Crashed Ice world championship event at the Ottawa Locks – beside the Chateau Laurier and Major’s Hill Park – on March 3 and 4.

The Red Bull Crashed Ice season was announced on Oct. 12. Leading up to Ottawa, the season will make stops in Marseille, France on Jan. 13 and 14, Jyväskylä-Laajis, Finland for a second year in a row on Jan. 20 and 21. Saint Paul, Minn. will be the venue for the third race on Feb. 3 and 4 with the season concluding in Ottawa.

In a press release, the championship’s sporting director Christian Papillon said this year welcomes two new environments.

“This sport just keeps growing in popularity every year and this year is definitely going to take it to the next level," Papillon said. "… Le Vieux Port de Marseille in France is a mind-boggling location because it's not even close to being a winter city, and we're going to introduce a new location in Ottawa. They're going to be insane."

According to the organization, ice machines will create a race track to compensate for the Mediterranean temperatures in Marseille.

The event features a downhill course, about 400 metres long, with jumps. Skaters can travel up to 82 kilometres per hour while skating downhill.

Racers compete four at a time, with the first two to cross the finish line advancing to the next round. There are both men’s and women’s divisions.

Event organizers have made a point to host events in urban areas with interesting backdrops – such as in Niagara Falls and Quebec City – and internationally in cities such as Moscow, Helsinki, and Valkenburg in the Netherlands.

The course is built with spectator stands all around, lighting for evening events, and often features music and DJs.

The event is one of the many events the city has secured as part of its Canada 150th anniversary celebrations.

http://www.ottawacommunitynews.com/n...ice-in-ottawa/

[rocketphish]

Ottawa 2017 comes with $3.5 million in additional city costs
Major events to come with big bills for policing, road closures, extra staff.

By: Ryan Tumilty, Metro
Published on Mon Dec 05 2016

The extra hours for police, paramedics and a host of other city services for Ottawa 2017 events will cost about $3.5 million next year.

A report going to council’s finance and economic development committee on Tuesday has the breakdown for Ottawa 2017 events, like Red Bull Crashed Ice and the Sky Lounge.

The report was requested earlier this year by Coun. Diane Deans, who asked what the city’s costs would be and where the money would be found.

Deans was unavailable for an interview Monday.

The report lists 16 major events next year as part of the celebration for Canada’s 150th birthday.

The most expensive event will be Canada Day, where the city expects an additional $1.5 million in costs above and beyond a usual year.

Another expensive item for the Ottawa 2017 office is expected to be La Machine, an art installation project that involves a large mechanical spider and dragon that breathes fire moving around to various part along the city.

The city estimates $512,000 in direct cost for that event alone. The Red Bull Crashed Ice event is the second most expensive event on the list, with an expected $332,000 price tag.

In total, 10 of the events are being funded through the Ottawa 2017 office at a cost of $1.2 million. An additional two events – the Grey Cup and New Year’s Eve celebrations – are funded by the office with partner funding.

Guy Laflamme, executive director of Ottawa 2017, said all of that money has been found and budgeted for.

“We have budgeted for an amount in the order of $1.5 million to cover any extra demand on municipal services,” he said.

LaFlamme said both La Machine and Crashed Ice will be large events with thousands of people downtown, which is why those costs are so high.

He said they have been working closely with the city’s special events advisory team to ensure everything is in place.

“They’re the one who are assessing the cost and the value of all of our needs.”

http://www.metronews.ca/news/ottawa/...ity-costs.html

[rocketphish]

Ottawa 2017 Crashed Ice skating spectacle years in the making

Matthew Pearson, Ottawa Citizen
Published on: February 11, 2017 | Last Updated: February 11, 2017 8:20 AM EST



In 1922, the main attraction at the inaugural Ottawa Winter Carnival was a giant ski and toboggan slide that extended from the Château Laurier all the way down to the icy expanse of the Ottawa River.

Thrillseekers paid a dime to take the plunge down a chute that fell at a daring 45-degree angle and ran alongside the Rideau Canal locks, sometimes reaching speeds in excess of 100 km/h.

It’s an image Guy Laflamme clung to year after year as he patiently and persistently tried to convince Red Bull to bring its famed Crashed Ice skating race to Ottawa as part of the city’s 2017 celebrations.

The Ottawa 2017 Bureau boss says he first travelled to Quebec City nine years ago to watch the race and meet the promoters, hoping to persuade them to bring it to the capital. When he finally convinced them to visit about three years ago, he made his pitch by walking them down by the locks and pointing out all the key landmarks nearby, including the Parliament Buildings, National Gallery and Museum of History.

He also had to persuade the National Capital Commission, Public Works and Parks Canada, which manages the locks.

Construction is now underway on a 300-metre track, which begins from a scaffolding perch about four metres above the Château Laurier’s outdoor terrace, makes a sharp twist near Wellington Street and then plunges down the locks toward the river. There may be other twists and turns as well, but the detailed plan for the course is kept under wraps until closer to the race.





It will be one of the most technically challenging courses skaters have faced, says Laflamme.

It’s the 1920s toboggan run on steroids, he jokes. But sorry kids, you can’t ride it for a dime.

Ice cross downhill claims to be the fastest sport on skates. Athletes plunge down a track filled with drops, hairpin turns and gaps at speeds of up to 80 km/h. They compete in groups of four, pushing, sliding and sprinting to the bottom, trying to collect the most points and be crowned world champion at season’s end.

The road to Ottawa, site of next month’s championships, included stops in France, Finland and the United States.

Laflamme says the event will let Ottawa show off the canal and the city’s love for skating in a new and edgy way, while also offering a nod to history by holding it in the same place as that famous toboggan run.

Plus, the capital’s most beautiful and iconic landmarks will form the backdrop in the national and international television coverage.

“We couldn’t dream of a better scenario,” he said. “If we want to really set the tone and demonstrate that (Ottawa 2017) is about presenting a more vibrant image, this fits all our criteria.”

Ottawa 2017, which is funded by three levels of government and corporate sponsors, is paying Red Bull $1.1 million to bring the two-day event to town. It’s also picking up the tab for police, paramedics, street closures and re-routing OC Transpo buses.

But Laflamme says the company in return will invest millions more here on track construction, promotion, ice and snow removal, and all the necessary permits. The event is also free for spectators, he notes, so locals and visitors can spend more money at restaurants and hotels.

There will be numerous places to take in the action.





The space along either side of the locks, which Laflamme calls “the bowl,” will hold some 20,000 people, he says. “That’s where the diehard fans will want to be located.” Videos from previous Crashed Ice events show people banging on the boards as skaters whiz by.

Large screens will also be set up in Major’s Hill Park and on York Street in the ByWard Market. For the March 4 grand finale, where the 2016-17 champion will be crowned, there will also be screens on Wellington Street, which will be closed for the day between Mackenzie Avenue and Elgin Street.

VIP tickets selling for $290 each provide exclusive access to the Château Laurier’s terrace, which is immediately adjacent to the track.

Based in Austria, Red Bull has parlayed its popular energy drink into a massive global company valued at $7.9 billion.

The company has its own television channel and is aligned with numerous extreme sports and music festivals. It launched Crashed Ice in 2001.

mpearson@postmedia.com
twitter.com/mpearson78

http://ottawacitizen.com/news/local-...-in-the-making

[YOWflier]

At the Fire & Ice dinner/event tonight. 150 people having dinner at the Suntech greenhouse in Manotick. Chef Marc Lepine doing the cooking tonight. Amazing and unique event. Will post a photo later.

[YOWflier]

[waterloowarrior]

great photos... lots of tomato dishes on the menu?

[bikegypsy]

^^^ Great presentation!

[YOWflier]

Amazingly there was exactly one cherry tomato that I recall on the first dish. It was Suntech at least. They also had some Suntech green beans on the main elk dish.

[rocketphish]

Pretty amazing Red Bull Crashed Ice Ottawa track animation video. They're going to end up right down inside the final lock:

http://www.ottawa2017.ca/events/sign...l-crashed-ice/

[rocketphish]

A crash course on Crashed Ice, the big event coming to Ottawa next weekend

Bruce Deachman, Ottawa Citizen
Published on: February 23, 2017 | Last Updated: February 23, 2017 6:35 PM EST

It says something about the emerging-but-still-niche popularity of ice cross downhill — a sport most people wouldn’t even know by name — that as 30 or so safety-vested journalists gathered Thursday at the mouth of the Rideau Canal to tour the Red Bull Crashed Ice track, Daniel Guolla stood among them, largely ignored.

The 26-year-old Ottawan has been competing on the Red Bull tour for the past three years and is the lone native son who will take part in next Saturday’s season-finale to determine the 2017 world champion.

Guolla, who works at Nordstrom in the nearby Rideau Centre, has been coming to the site every couple of days since construction began three weeks ago, and his appearance Thursday was pure happenstance. He likes watching the track take shape, and on each visit he visualizes the strategies he might employ during his races.

He likes the Ottawa track, he says, because the final 75-metre portion of it is a lot more challenging than many other tracks he’s been on, meaning that the races really won’t be over until they’re over, and each one could be won or lost in the final few metres.



He points to a pair of hillocks, or rollers, fairly close together in the final stretch. “They’re usually a lot smaller, and look at the space between them,” he says. “A lot of guys are going to try and jump that — I know I’ll try — and I guarantee you there’ll be at least 10 face-plants here. I just hope I’m not one of them.

“It’s a tricky course with a lot of bumps and turns, and this is the last stop (in the season), so guys will be putting it all on the line, trying to win. It’s a big show.”

There’s both good and bad news for Guolla, a former junior hockey player and downhill skier who immediately fell in love with ice cross when, as a 16-year-old, he watched it for the first time on TV.

The bad news is that he can’t win the world title this year. Red Bull’s competitive season this year consists of nine events — four major ones, including Ottawa’s, and five smaller ones — with athletes earning points based on how well they do at each. Even a first–place finish in next weekend’s competition won’t earn Guolla, who’s ranked 31st in men’s world standings and ninth in Canada, enough points to finish on top. In fact, he notes, only four men’s competitors have a shot at the championship: defending title-holder and current points leader Cameron Naasz from the U.S., fellow countryman Maxwell Dunne, Canadian Scott Croxall, and Austrian Marco Dallago. Naasz, Croxall and Dallago have each won the world title once.

The good news is that Guolla is competing in his home city in front of an expected crowd of 60,000 to 100,000 people, and the tropical weather that has recently befallen O-town won’t cause a cancellation. The 375-metre track is artificially cooled, with four chillers pumping 36,000 litres of salt-water brine through refrigerated mats underneath. According to Patrice Drouin, president of Gestev, the company building the track, there’s enough cooling power to make ice in weather up to about 20C. It will take four solid days, he adds, for his team of 20 icemakers to make the ice.

Organizers expect that the “bowl,” the area immediately surrounding the track along the Rideau Canal, will accommodate 18,000 to 20,000 spectators. Others, in Majors Hill Park, along Wellington Street and on York Street in the ByWard Market, will be able to watch on large TV monitors.

Ice cross downhill originated in Sweden in 2001, when Red Bull built its first course through Stockholm’s fish market. For nearly a decade, the sport’s races were one-off annual promotional events attracting mostly young hockey players looking to do something crazy and have a fun time on Red Bull’s dime.



In 2010, the energy drink company created the world championship points circuit that saw a weeding out of the weekend warriors in favour of athletes who, like Guolla, are devoted to the sport.

Competitors, racing in groups of four, wear helmets, chest guards, shoulder protection, elbow pads, pants with plastic padding, knee and shinbone protection, and gloves. Casual contact is permitted, but any interference via holding, pushing, or hitting, and any purposeful hindrance that slows an opponent results in disqualification.

This year marks the first junior championship event, for competitors age 16-21, which will take place next Friday evening. Saturday’s women’s championship will feature about 30 competitors; the men’s will likely see 100 or more in Friday’s time trials, with the top 64 squaring off in bracketed heats each featuring four racers, with the top two qualifying for the next round. The four finalists in the men’s competition will have complete five races on Saturday.

“It’s fun,” says Guolla. “ I love that it’s competitive. I can compete against guys who are the best.

“(But) no one is doing this for the money. They’re all guys in their 20s who are taking the opportunity to travel and compete and have a lot of fun. Coming to these races is the most fun I have in my life.”


FACTS & NUMBERS

Course length: 375 metres
Width: 4 metres
Vertical drop: 35 metres
Total ice surface area: 1,500 sq. metres
Ice thickness: 12 cm.
Salt-water brine piped through the refrigeration system: 36,000 litres
Amount of scaffolding required: 300 tons.
Man-hours of labour required to build track and ice: 10,000
Estimated time for a competitor to complete the race: 35 seconds
Estimated top speed: 70 k/hr
Number of spectators that the “bowl,” or area along the Rideau Canal surrounding the track, is expected to hold Next Saturday night: 18,000 to 20,000
Total number of spectators expected to watch the event, either in the “bowl” or on Wellington Street, the ByWard Market or Majors Hill Park, where large-screen monitors will be set up: 60,000 to 100,000
Estimated number of spectators at the Crashed Ice event in Edmonton in 2015: 70,000
Largest crowd at a Crashed Ice event: 100,000+ annually in St. Paul, Minnesota

The ice used in Crashed Ice events is five times as dense as NHL ice. About 85 per cent of the wood used in constructing the track will be repurposed for other Ottawa 2017 events, and repurposed again for Habitat for Humanity projects.

Saturday’s races will be broadcast live on TVA, Sportsnet 360 and Red Bull TV, beginning at 8:30 p.m.


bdeachman@postmedia.com

http://ottawacitizen.com/news/local-...on-crashed-ice

[rocketphish]

Ottawa 2017 organizers, hoteliers prepare for Red Bull Crashed Ice weekend

Craig Lord, OBJ
Published on March 02, 2017

Some 600,000 pounds of lumber, numerous hotel bookings and more than a fair share of hype have gone into preparations for Red Bull Crashed Ice, one of the first marquee events scheduled for what’s been billed as a year full of celebrations for Canada’s 150th anniversary.

Ottawa 2017 head Guy Laflamme says he has been “crazy, crazy wild busy” in the lead-up to the weekend’s events, but is confident the event will run as smooth as ice.

Speaking of ice, Mr. Laflamme says the week’s warm weather has not ruined conditions on the course, and that the drop in temperature and anticipated bit of snow will “add some magic to the site.”

“The course is pretty spectacular when you see the scope of the infrastructure that’s been brought in,” he says.

While Ottawa 2017 has spent more than $1 million in the event, including costs for municipal services and borrowing space from Parks Canada and the National Capital Commission, Red Bull has put millions more into the event that will cap off its 2016-2017 Crashed Ice season.

The entire project requires a workforce of 150 people, including carpenters, electricians and other contractors, and 10,000 hours of labour to construct, according to Red Bull. Mr. Laflamme adds that Red Bull has increased the amount of local labour it’s used in the track’s construction this past week, but did not have specific figures.

The track itself is 375 metres long with a 35-metre vertical drop. The ice surface, which has been sprayed with water for the past few days by a team of 20 ice makers, is 1,500 square metres and is 12 centimetres thick.

The track features 600,000 pounds of scaffolding, 123,500 pounds of steel beams and 1,400 plywood sheets. Ottawa 2017 is also working with the Sustainable Forestry Initiative to repurpose more than 85 per cent of wood in the track for other events throughout the year and for use in Habitat for Humanity and ReStores projects.

The area around the track has capacity for 20,000 spectators, but viewing platforms are being set up in Major’s Hill Park and screens broadcasting the event will be set up along York Street on both nights as well as along Wellington Street on Saturday. Mr. Laflamme anticipates more than 100,000 live viewers.

The event will also be broadcast by Red Bull around the world, including on Sportsnet and French-language channel TVA. Mr. Laflamme says the broadcast reach is in the tens of millions.

Tourism officials typically covet television coverage of sporting events, which are typically interspersed with attractive cityscape shots and iconic images that showcase the host city as a destination.

“We couldn't dream of a better postcard early in the year of our most scenic backdrops,” he says. “This event really illustrates what Ottawa 2017 is all about: Presenting traditional heritage aspects of our city but in an eclectic, vibrant way.”

Mr. Laflamme adds that if all goes well and Red Bull considers the event a success, the extreme sports brand could bring Crashed Ice back to Ottawa in three years.

Next door to the track, the Chateau Laurier is nearly fully booked for the two-night event. Deneen Perrin, spokesperson for the hotel, says there’s already a great vibe at Chateau, and that expectations remain strong for the remainder of Ottawa 2017.

Down the road at the Lord Elgin Hotel, general manager David Smythe told the OBJ that as of Tuesday, there was still room for weekend bookings at the Lord Elgin and its sister hotels, but that there was “definitely a pick-up” with Crashed Ice over previous years.

He says that so far the year has been fairly traditional in terms of bookings, but that he anticipates demand to rise in the spring, summer and fall months.

http://www.obj.ca/Local/Tourism/2017...-Ice-weekend/1

[rocketphish]

Roads closed for Crashed Ice events this weekend
Plan your drive downtown carefully this weekend, as many roads will be shut

CBC News
Posted: Mar 02, 2017 5:00 AM ET Last Updated: Mar 02, 2017 3:33 PM ET

If you're not lacing up your skates and hurling yourself down the Crashed Ice track at the Rideau Canal locks, you likely won't be racing anywhere near Ottawa's downtown this weekend.

Crashed Ice events get started Friday, and that means many roads will be closed downtown.

York Street in the ByWard Market will be closed Friday and Saturday nights, and won't reopen until 8 a.m Sunday. That area will be used for vendors and some big screen televisions so people can watch the races.

Portions of Elgin and Wellington streets will also be closed starting at 3 p.m. Saturday, and stay shut until Sunday morning. A portion of Wellington will have video screens, vendor stands and a partial view of the track.

Several OC Transpo routes will be detoured around the road closures, including routes 1, 2, 4, 5, 7, 9, 12, 14 and 18. Those detours will be in effect from Saturday at 3 p.m. until around 1 a.m. Sunday.

See the maps below for details.





http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa...-ice-1.4002844

[rocketphish]

Red Bull to bring Rallycross auto racing championship to Ottawa as Canada 150 event

Vito Pilieci, Ottawa Citizen
Published on: March 23, 2017 | Last Updated: March 23, 2017 10:19 AM EDT

Red Bull is adding Ottawa as a stop in its 2017 Global Rallycross racing series this June, marking the first time one of the events has been held in Canada.

The two-day race event on June 17-18 features 16 drivers at the wheel of 600-horsepower super cars on a track that will be built at the Canada Aviation and Space Museum.

The course will incorporate part of the runway at the Rockcliffe Airport, but will require construction of a large dirt track component, complete with a 70-foot jump near the finish line, to complete the circuit.

Red Bull announced the race on Thursday morning, saying that the caffeinated drink manufacturer chose Ottawa in an effort to help mark Canada’s 150th anniversary of Confederation.

“As the nation’s capital, we’re happy to welcome this exciting event to Canada for the first time. Red Bull Global Rallycross will thrill participants and viewers across the country and around the world, while showcasing our city in a new and dynamic way,” said Ottawa Mayor Jim Watson is quoted in the release as saying.

“In support of Ecology Ottawa’s One Million Trees project and to further support this important legacy of the sesquicentennial year, the series’ organizers have committed to planting 10,000 trees in Ottawa.”

“As Ottawa 2017 celebrates the 150th anniversary of Canada, we can’t think of a better way to join the celebration than by staging an event in the nation’s capital,” said Red Bull Global Rallycross chief executive Colin Dyne. “We’ve been fortunate to see many Canadian fans at our events in the United States over the years, and we’re looking forward to bringing our racing formula north for the very first time, and to the Canada Aviation and Space Museum.”

“Red Bull Global Rallycross will be yet another legacy of the Ottawa 2017 celebrations, with the opportunity for the event to return in subsequent years. It’s one of the bold new events we are helping to bring to Canada’s capital,” said Guy Laflamme, executive director of the Ottawa 2017 Bureau in the release. “We’re equally happy to engage our federal partners at the Canada Aviation and Space Museum to showcase this important institution on an international scale.”

The 2017 Global Rallycross season will also feature stops in Memphis, Louisville, Indianapolis, and Atlantic City, NJ, among other destinations. Ottawa is only Canadian event on the schedule.

The announcement comes on the heels of the recently concluded Red Bull Crashed Ice event, which was held earlier this month at a course built outside the Château Laurier over the Rideau Canal locks. The event attracted tens of thousands of spectators who braved frigid weather to watch race through an icy series of jumps and turns at breakneck speeds.

Tickets are available and range in price from $60 (for children) to $200.

For the “Super Fan”, the event is offering a $5,000 package that includes a practice round ride-along in one of the cars, a club pass and other “exclusive access.”

http://ottawacitizen.com/news/local-...nada-150-event

[rocketphish]

I guess this will shut-down the Rockcliffe airport for a while. No details on the track location yet:

http://redbullglobalrallycross.com/e...17-2/canada-i/

[rocketphish]

The city has setup a website for this now too:
http://www.ottawa2017.ca/red-bull-global-rallycross

[rocketphish]

Maybe because nobody has heard of this initiative? I hadn't until now...

Urban camping sites in Ottawa not filling up for Canada 150 events
With about two months to go, almost 90 per cent of camping sites outside city recreation centres are still available.

By: Tamar Harris, Metro
Published on Tue Apr 25 2017

People looking to pitch a tent outside a city recreation centre during Canada Day festivities still have plenty of spots open to them, as there has been only limited demand so far.

Forty-one tent sites have been sold out of a total 235 available across the city, and 19 RV sites have been sold out of an available 336 (263 are available for RVs and 73 are available for Long RVs).

Urban camping sites in 10 city parking lots and green spaces will be set up to facilitate the number of visitors pouring into the city for Canada 150 celebrations. Ottawa began selling urban camping units across the city in March.

Dan Chenier, the general manager for Recreation, Cultural and Facility Services for the City of Ottawa, said he anticipates sales for urban camp sites will increase as Canada Day nears and people firm up their summer plans.

“Because we’ve never done this before, we didn’t really have a sense of what the market was,” said Chenier. “We didn’t really have expectations on this.”

Ottawa typically has enough accommodations to facilitate the average number of tourists and visitors it receives as a capital city – but the anticipated influx this summer has hotels and motels across the city booking up in advance. That’s why Ottawa is offering urban camping.

“It became evident quite early in the year that hotel and motel occupancies would be at an all-time high,” said Chenier. “In fact, some establishments had already sold out for that weekend. The 2017 office proposed to the city that we look at offering an urban camping option for folks that couldn’t find accommodations in the city for the Canada Day weekend.”

Quebec City and Gatineau have offered similar urban camping programs in the past.

Urban camping is being offered in municipal parking lots and green spaces across the city in three or five-night packages between June 29 and July 4. Five-night packages sold best, Chenier said, because of an early-bird special.

Sites were selected because of their central location and the presence of nearby facilities with washrooms and showers for campers to use.

Chenier said that the Tom Brown Arena site, which is located closest to Parliament Hill, is far by the most popular site with 30 spots already sold.

With a little over two months before Canada 150 kicks into gear, almost 90 per cent of urban camping sites are still available.

http://www.metronews.ca/news/ottawa/...0-events-.html

[Kitchissippi]

Originally Posted by rocketphish

Maybe because nobody has heard of this initiative? I hadn't until now...

I heard of this way back. It's not filling up because maybe charging $220.50 to set up a tent for 3 nights is a bit exorbitant?

http://ottawa.ca/en/residents/recrea...n-camping-2017

[rocketphish]

Originally Posted by Kitchissippi

I heard of this way back. It's not filling up because maybe charging $220.50 to set up a tent for 3 nights is a bit exorbitant?

http://ottawa.ca/en/residents/recrea...n-camping-2017

I also wonder how they are advertising this to out-of-towners, the prime market for this initiative.

[rocketphish]

Snowbirds and famed Patrouille de France to highlight Aero 150 air show in Gatineau

Blair Crawford, Ottawa Citizen
Published on: April 25, 2017 | Last Updated: April 25, 2017 5:11 PM EDT



It’ll be a battle of the home team Snowbirds and the tricoloured visitors Patrouille de France this Sunday at Aero 150, a special edition air show in the National Capital Region.

It’s the first visit to Canada since 1986 for the Patrouille, who are as famous for roaring over the Champs-Élysée on Bastille Day as the Snowbirds are for their Canada Day flypasts on Parliament Hill.

“I’m sure there’ll be some vying for bragging rights,” said Girvan Patterson, spokesman for Aero 150.

“The Snowbirds have actually altered their schedule slightly so they can be here for this.”

Canadian Forces Snowbirds will perform Sunday at Aero 150 in Gatineau. Jack Boland / Jack Boland/Toronto Sun

The Snowbirds are no stranger to Ottawa-Gatineau with their annual Canada appearance, but a full show from the Royal Canadian Air Force aerobatic team is less common. Sunday’s show will be the first of the Snowbirds’ 2017 season. The team arrives on Friday.

Formed in 1931, the eight-plane Patrouille de France is the world’s oldest aerobatic team and will visit Ottawa-Gatineau at the end of a North American tour. The team flies sleek Alpha jets and is backed up by a massive Airbus A400 support plane.

“They have a very French panache,” Patterson said. “They’re very elegant and beautifully painted, and with the red white and blue smoke they put on a really good show.”

Other aircraft scheduled to perform include the Second World War-era Hawker Hurricane, North American P-51 Mustang and Vought Corsair belonging to Ottawa tech magnate Michael Potter’s Vintage Wings collection, a flypast by an RCAF Aurora maritime patrol aircraft, and a Starduster aerobatic biplane. The Canadian Forces Skyhawks parachute team will also put on an aerial display.

Flying in but on static ground display will be two Royal Air Force Typhoon jets, which arrive Saturday around 5 p.m., and an RCAF CF-18, also arriving Saturday. The air force’s designated air show CF-18 was not available, Patterson said.

“Ironically, the Canada 150th commemorative jet is committed to an air show in Louisiana that weekend.”

Admission to the air show at Gatineau-Ottawa Executive Airport at 1717 Rue Arthur-Fecteau is free, although a donation of $5 is suggested. The wet spring means the usual parking isn’t available, so the air show will be using street parking and parking in nearby industrial lots. A shuttle bus will bring visitors to the site. Patterson urges visitors to car pool if possible and arrive early to avoid congestion.

The Gatineau air show usually takes place in the summer, but organizers only learned in December that the Patrouille de France would be available. That left just a few months to organize a show they usually begin planning a year in advance.

“It’s been busy,” Patterson said. “It’s going to be a big deal. It’s going to be one of the first big Canada 150 celebrations.”

The one thing organizers can’t plan for, of course, is the weather. That looks iffy, with the forecast calling for a 70 per cent chance of rain and a high of 14 C.

Those who can’t make the show can still watch it online. Aero 150 plans to live-stream the whole six-hour performance on its website. For more information and a full list of aircraft, visit aero150.com

bcrawford@postmedia.com
Twitter.com/getBAC

http://ottawacitizen.com/news/local-...ow-in-gatineau

[YOWetal]

Originally Posted by rocketphish

I also wonder how they are advertising this to out-of-towners, the prime market for this initiative.

Have you seen how much hotels are charging for the weekend? The skid row places along Rideau were asking $400 a night. Basically everywhere else is sold out.