Cool Aeronautics Ottawa
On Thursday, May 2, a Cool Aeronautics event was held in Canada for the very first time. Organised by the RAeS Young Persons Network in Canada and taking place at the Canada Aviation and Space Museum in Ottawa, over 70 students from two local schools participated in a fun day of everything aerospace.
In the morning, participants heard from three guest speakers. Captain Kate Speer from Porter Airlines described the many different types of flying that a pilot can do. Frederic Roy from NAV Canada explained what the company does and what careers exist in air traffic control, flight services, technical operations, engineering and supporting roles. To finish off the morning part of the event, Pascale Lachance from the Transportation Safety Board of Canada outlined the investigation process. The children got to participate by trying to guess what had happened to aircraft in the photos.
In the afternoon, students participated in three hands-on STEM workshops. They learned about the ejection seat and had an opportunity to try out helmets and flight suits. They made paper planes and conducted “test flights”, and designed their own aircraft to fly around the world.
