Page 20 - March 2018

We Lose an Aviation Hero At the end of the war, Kutyn returned to
Edmonton, where he joined the post office.
It is a sad fact of collecting aviation heritage that we are losing
But he missed flying and in 1949 he joined
many of those who have contributed to that legacy.
the ranks of "weekend warriors" flying with
Such is the case with Michael 418 City of Edmonton Squadron.
Kutyn, who died January 3, at
Tragically, Kutyn's own brother John, was
the age of 95.
killed in the crash of a 418 Squadron Mitchell
bomber in January 1955, but Kutyn himself
Kutyn was a Word War II navigator who was awarded the
says he was never fearful about his own
Distinguished Flying Cross (DFC), then returned to Edmonton
safety while in the air, despite the fact that
where he flew for another 20 years as part of 418 (City of he was involved in three crashes during the
Edmonton) Squadron.
war, and four more post war.
"I had faith above I guess. I was never scared.
I always felt like my life was in good hands,"
he told our Blatchford Tales Oral History
Project in 2013. "And to have that kind of
feeling when you have been in all those
airplane crashes. And your still talking to
him."

Growing up in Wildwood, just west of Edmonton he
remembers being enchanted after seeing his first real Movie Pick of the Month
airplane.

"One Sunday as we were having dinner we heard this strange
noise," he wrote in Diary of an RCAF Serviceman, a memoir of
his years in the military. "It was an airplane flying directly over
the house. It looked beautiful against the blue sky. From that
moment on, my ambition was to fly airplanes."

But after joining the RCAF in 1941 he changed his mind. He
got into a spin during a solo flight. That incident scared him so
much he decided to become a navigator instead.

And what a navigator he was. After training in Britain, he
finished at the top of his class with 87 per cent. He was (click poster to watch in YouTube)
assigned to a special unit flying two Halifax bombers and two The Way Ahead (aka "Immortal Battalion")
Lancaster bombers to India, the first time British bombers (1944) is a British Second World War drama,
would make that trip.
full length feature film, english. Cast: David
In the fall of 1944 Kutyn was lead navigator for a 1000 aircraft Niven, Stanley Holloway and William Hartnell.
raid on the German city of Duisburg. The Way Ahead follows a group of civilians
That flight, along with 30 other bombing raids in which he who are conscripted into the British Army to
served as navigator, earned him the Distinguished Flying Cross fight in North Africa.
in 1945.