NWT Air welcomed its third Boeing 737 jet to Yellowknife this week after months of anticipation.

The $6 million combination cargo-passenger aircraft means the airline won’t have to lease replacements from Echo Bay Mines while it’s two other 737s are grounded for yearly month-long inspections.

“We definitely needed a new one that” says aircraft program manager, Henry Tenby.

It wasn’t an easy job says Tenby. Boeing 737–200 “Combi” jets, as the double duty models used by North NWT and Canadian North are known, aren’t easy to find.

Boeing doesn’t make them anymore and hardly any are on the market at one time.

Passengers might notice a slightly more attractive interior, though not much else. The new jet which has been dubbed “Snowball” has been waiting for a new paint job, carried up to 72 passengers and two cargo packages just like the others in the NWT Air fleet.

But the pilots who flew it from Edmonton to Yellowknife on its inaugural flight (Captain Searle Hartman) said they like the way it handled.

It should also allow NWT to increase its Yellowknife to Edmond and schedule to five days a week from three.

Snowball is more than 12 years old and was with former Pacific Western Airlines fleet (CF-PWE) until the mid 1980s. It was sold to an American carrier and was Presidential candidate Michael Dukakis’ campaign jet in 1988.

More recently, the jet flew under the Air Zaire banner, which is now hidden beneath a new coat of white paint. Tenby says the airline would like to give the aircraft some distinctive colours.

“We can do something creative with that. I’m hoping we can put a polar bear on the nose” said Tenby.

Anyone with an idea for Jets can give NWT Air a call.

Yellowknife – October 28 1994: ATR42 demonstration flight to NWT Air YZF-YZF, this was a 30 minute air time local flight. The aircraft was being ferried from the ATR factory in France to Mahalo Airlines in Honolulu, Hawaii, so they stopped in to visit us at NWT Air for a demo.

At the time, one of my job responsibilities whilst employed by the airline was aircraft leasing and fleet planning and analysis. I also worked very closely in this capacity with the DFO and the Manager of Dispatch, and the Cargo Manager. I was in regular contact with the folks at ATR and we put this impromptu visit together with somewhat short notice.

Dan Murphy my boss and our General Manager is seated far left. Donna Prouse was the first female pilot at NWT Air. Did she fly for Air Tindi prior to joining NWT Air? Then Wally LeMay. I think that is Ross Drewniak on the right side window. Photos were taken by me.

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Henry Tenby has become a regular sight on the rocks behind the Air Tindi float base, where he spends much of his spare time getting pictures of exotic float planes.

Talking to Henry Tenby is like discovering a new and exotic culture. Tenby is an aviation enthusiast, and airplanes occupy most of his waking life.

He works for an airline, builds model airplanes in his spare time, spends his evenings down by the Air Tindi float base in Yellowknife’s Old Town, waiting to ambush out-of-town float planes with his camera. He exchanges letters with airplane buffs around the world, and even helps organize conventions for enthusiasts.

Apart from taking and trading photos of airplanes, Henry Tenby has also amassed a large collection of airplane models, and is seen here admiring an NWT Air Hercules in his Yellowknife office.

Most importantly, airplane buffs collect pictures of airplanes. Ramp shots, they call them: planes on airport tarmacs, with no people or baggage trains in view.

“It‘s like a little confraternity,” says Larry Milberry, a publisher of aviation books who was in the N.W.T. last week to visit Tenby and bone up on his Northern aviation history.

“When they get together, they have what I view as infernal slide shows,” Milberry says. The buffs will watch tray after tray of airplane slides, for hours at a time, he says.

“This is like a world—wide hobby,” Milberry says “it’s huge for example in Japan . . . The airplane spotters in Britain are absolute maniacs.”

40,000 slides

Tenby is a bit of a non-conformist within the aviation culture, because he likes to take pictures of airplanes in flight, and hopes one day to put together a book of air-to-air photos.

At the ripe age of 28, he has already collected 40,000 plane slides, of which he estimates he
probably shot 15,000 himself.

But then again, he first got interested in aviation back in 1967.

“My grandmother took me out to the observation deck at Vancouver airport,” he says. “It was love at first sight.”

Back home in Vancouver, he has 50 airline display models of fibreglass. “I don’t own a home big enough to store them all,” he says.

When Tenby graduated from school, he went to North Dakota to do a bachelors in aviation. He then went on to do a masters in business administration.

Tenby got a job in Seattle with an aircraft-leasing company. But when the company tried to transfer him to a job in Peru, the scene of a nasty civil war, Tenby balked.

He called up an acquaintance at NWT Air and got work with the airline, choosing planes and helping with budgeting and scheduling.

“Yellowknife is fascinating from an aviation standpoint,” Tenby says.

The fact that many Northern communities are only accessible by air and the large number of float planes in the North make Yellowknife an ideal spot for the hard-core aviation buff, he says.