Yarmouth Airport

Wreck of Fairey Swordfish at No.1 NAGS, 1943

In 1936, the Department of National Defence selected the site as a base for Maritime patrol aircraft. The airport land was owned by Frederick Eyre and it was taken by the government against his will to build the airport. The airbase had two parts, East Camp and West Camp. The West Camp was home to the Royal Canadian Air Force while the East Camp was part of the British Commonwealth Air Training Plan. At East Camp, the Royal Air Force's No. 34 Operational Training Unit (OTU) was located at Yarmouth from April 1942 to June 1942, when it was relocated to RCAF Station Pennfield Ridge, New Brunswick. In November 1942 the Royal Navy established the No. 1 Naval Air Gunnery School (NAGS), flying the Fairey Swordfish. No. 1 NAGS ceased operations in March 1945.

In addition to the Naval Air Gunnery School, several individual squadrons and units called RCAF Yarmouth home at various times during the war, including:

• No. 5 Squadron RCAF, from August 1944 to May 1945, flying the Consolidated Catalina Mk. 1;
• No. 113 Squadron RCAF, from February 1942 to May 1943, flying the Lockheed Hudson. A 113 Squadron Hudson flying from Yarmouth sank U-754 on 31 July 1942, Eastern Air Command's first kill;
• No. 119 Squadron RCAF, from July 1940 to January 1942, flying the Bristol Bolingbroke;
• No. 160 Squadron RCAF, from July 1943 to August 1944, flying the Consolidated Canso;
• No. 161 Squadron RCAF, from November 1944 to May 1945, flying the Consolidated Canso;
• No. 162 Squadron RCAF, from May 1942 (formation) to September 1943, flying the Consolidated Canso; and
• No. 6 (Canadian Artillery Corps) Detachment, from December 1941 to November 1943, flying the Westland Lysander in a coast artillery cooperation role.

In addition, No. 419 Squadron RCAF and No. 428 Squadron RCAF were disbanded in Yarmouth in September 1945 after the Surrender of Japan. Both squadrons, flying the Avro Lancaster, were to be trained and re-equipped for the Commonwealth Tiger Force in the Pacific Theatre.

In approximately 1942 the aerodrome was listed at 43°50′N 66°05′W with a Var. 20 degrees W and elevation of 133 feet (41 m). Three runways were listed as follows:[5]

After the war, the airfield switched to public/commercial use when it was transferred to Transport Canada. Regularly scheduled service was started by Trans-Canada Air Lines (TCA) which in 1947 was operating daily round trip Halifax, NS - Yarmouth, NS - Saint John, NB - Boston service.[6] By 1962, TCA was continuing to operate daily flights from the airport with nonstop service to Boston as well as direct flights to Halifax via a stop in Saint John both flown with Vickers Viscount turboprop airliners.[7] Trans-Canada then became Air Canada in 1965.

Ownership of Yarmouth Airport was transferred from Transport Canada to the Yarmouth Airport Commission Association on October 1, 1997.[2] Air Canada flights into Yarmouth ceased in January 2003.[8] Since then, several small operators have provided air service between Halifax and Yarmouth at various times. These include Sou'West Air, who covered the route in 2003, and Starlink Airlines, which flew between Halifax, Yarmouth and Portland, Maine in 2009.[9] The latter lasted less than one year, despite a $2 million provincial government subsidy meant to carry the airline through the first few years of startup.[10] From March 15, 2010 to December 31, 2012, an American company, Twin Cities Air Service, provided service between Yarmouth and Portland with scheduled flights several times a week.[11][12] The airport has no scheduled passenger air service at the present time.

In 1975, Air Canada was operating daily flights with McDonnell Douglas DC-9-30 jetliners on a roundtrip routing of Halifax, NS - Saint John, NB - Yarmouth, NS - Boston.[13] Ten years later in 1985, Air Canada was still operating daily DC-9-30 jet service nonstop to Boston as well as direct to Halifax via a stop in Saint John with passengers bound for Toronto, Montreal and Ottawa having to change planes in Halifax according to the Air Canada timetable at the time.[14]

Air Canada then subsequently ceased mainline DC-9-30 jet flights into the airport with this service being replaced by Air Nova operating code sharing flights with regional turboprop aircraft on behalf of Air Canada.[15] According to the Official Airline Guide (OAG), in 1989 Air Nova was operating nonstop flights twice daily to both Boston and Halifax with de Havilland Canada DHC-8 Dash 8 aircraft. Ten years later in 1999, the OAG lists only one daily nonstop Dash 8 flight to Halifax operated by Air Nova on behalf of Air Canada with no service being flown to Boston at this time.