CANADIAN STORY

My Canadian story is one that starts in the United States. Last winter, I was engaged in a conversation at a RV resort in California.

I am not sure how, but we must have started talking about 9/11. I voiced the question that I have always wondered about, “If it was unsafe for planes to land on American soil, why was it okay for them to be diverted to Canadian airports to land and on who’s authority?” Imagine my shock, to hear the Americans say, “they did?” I was dumb struck. What did they think happened to all those planes? I am still shaking my head.

I found lots of excellent stories on the internet about Gander, Newfoundland, population 10,000, where 39 heavy aircraft landed, accommodating 6,600 diverted passengers for 5 days. It was 30 hours later by the time passengers from the last plane had been processed by the 4 Canadian Customs and Immigration officers.

Eventually I found more answers at www.freedomvillage.net/thankyoucanada.htm where I learned that within 45 minutes, a total of 224 planes with 33,000 passengers started landing at 17 airports across Canada.

Transport Canada activated its Situation Centre (SitCen) in Ottawa, a state of the art facility designed to provide emergency response where the decisions were made for Operation Yellow Ribbon.