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Mayor taking flight
Cold-weather testing brings big money to the capital

Peter Worden
Northern News Services
Published Monday, March 25, 2013

IQALUIT
When Mayor John Graham takes off on a trade mission for the Paris Air Show this June, he's hoping to land some major aircraft manufacturing companies to do their cold-weather testing in Iqaluit.

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A two-level Airbus A380, the world's largest civilian air transporter, sits in the sunrise at the Iqaluit airport on Jan. 30. - Peter Worden/NNSL photo

In February Iqaluit city councillors unanimously approved spending $30,000, in addition to a subsidy by the Aerospace Industries Association of Canada, to send Graham and one city representative to the air show along with a delegation of two aerospace industry personnel and two Canadian government officials.

Graham left council chambers for the vote. He said for every dollar spent on the mission, the city gets back $40 in local economic spinoff.

While Airbus, manufacturer of the world's-largest civil transporter, the A380, currently does its cold-weather testing in Iqaluit Graham said he's targeting the Eurocopter EC-175, which brings about 40 workers on its five-week project tests, to come to Iqaluit.

"It's brilliant for the economy to snag one of those missions," he said, adding other companies the city has in its sights are Dassault Aviation, Bombardier and Israeli Aerospace Industries. He also hopes to see the next largest civil airliner, the A350XWB, and the A400M military transporter, as well as more of the business jet market comes to the Nunavut capital.

Graham and Mark Morrissey, a fellow councillor and chair of the Community Economic Development Committee, met with Airbus representatives in February. They estimated the last two envoys of about 100 Airbus employees injected roughly a half-million dollars locally on accommodations, catering, fuel, vehicle rentals and cold-weather clothing since France has stringent health and safety regulations for its employees.

"The idea is to firmly keep planted in the minds of the manufacturers that our city of Iqaluit is the world's premier cold-weather testing facility," said Graham, who was formerly the Iqaluit airport manager and has attended the biannual show three times before.

At the last show, Graham said three of the biggest-ticket aircraft unveiled had been cold-weather tested in Iqaluit.

"We've got a real strong connection with the European manufacturing industry."

Manufacturers already fly new aircraft to South America for high altitude tests and the Middle East for heat and humidity tests. Graham hopes his city's desert-like dry-cold Eastern Arctic climate will be the go-to airport for new aviation products - all of which must undergo rigorous cold-weather tests in order to be certified through various state regulatory bodies before they can carry passengers.

Iqaluit has a long runway only a five-hour flight from Toulouse, France - home of Airbus, the world's largest civilian aircraft manufacturer.

The show, which is the world's largest such event, is held every two years at Le Bourget airport on the north end of Paris, where Charles Lindbergh landed after his first solo flight across the Atlantic. It is opened every year by the president of France and sees about 150,000 professional trade delegates from 48 countries, 2,000 exhibitors, 300 media and 150 of the latest aircraft on display.

"It's an absolutely huge event," said Graham. "When folks think of an air show I think they imagine you're on the ground looking up at the sky, which is not really what happens at the Paris Air Show."

With the aim of attracting aerospace industry officials to choose Iqaluit as their cold-weather testing location, Graham said the portion of the show that is closed to the public is "truly when the networking begins" with formal and informal business discussions.

While the Iqaluit airport itself doesn't make a lot of money on cold-weather testing, much of the money goes into businesses in the community.

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