Page 6 - RCAF Centenary

We start our journey in history with this note - the first RCAF casualties of World War II - only 4 days after the declaration of war on 10 September 1939.
Warrant Officer 2nd Class James E. Doan (1905-1939) and Corporal David A. Rennie (1914-1939)
On August 27, 1939, six Northrop Delta float planes in Squadron No. 8 were dispatched from RCAF Station Rockcliffe to Sydney Nova Scotia where they would begin offshore recon flights to track possible German U-boat activity. Built by Vickers these were the first all-metal stressed-skin aircraft built in Canada and were originally tasked to conduct aerial photography over the northern wilderness. However, for this new assignment they were refitted with a bomb rack and a Lewis machine gun in anticipation of defense missions. The formation was to fly directly over Maine with stops along the way.
Flying in a loose formation, Delta #673 flown by Doan developed reduced power and made an emergency landing on Salmon Stream Lake in Maine where Cpl. Rennie ascertained one of the 7 cylinders had to be replaced. Four Deltas continued on while #671 returned to Ottawa for replacement parts and tools. On August
30 Doan and Rennie were able to resume
their flight. But the problem persisted and both aircraft set down on Lac Mégantic. #671 returned to Ottawa, this time returning with an entire engine. By the time that engine swap was completed, war had broken out, Canada was at war with Germany. On September
14th at 09:55 they once again were airborne but now, with the US being neutral, they flew NE avoiding the shorter route through Maine. Now flying solo, that took them over terrain largely devoid of lakes on their way to Sydney. That’s when they vanished. Extensive searches failed to find any trace of the aircraft. The enquiry into the disappearance heard testimony by individuals in Riviére-du-Loup, then near Riviére Verte
and last at Plaster Rock reporting hearing an airplane overhead with its
engine ‘sputtering’. Nineteen years later a timber cruising crew came
across the badly wrecked aircraft, its crew long gone to predators.
Ted left behind his wife Vera and their two sons. David was grieved by his Ottawa family and his beloved girlfriend Lillian.
They were the first RCAF casualties of the war.
In the six years that followed, thousands more would fall.