NOORDUYN NORSEMAN

Canada's rugged, fabric-covered workhorse

- ROBERT S. GRANT

As Noorduyn Norseman UC-64B 43-5112 turned final approach on August 26, 1944, pilot Albert Hill idled the 600-hp Pratt & Whitney R-1340 engine and felt the airframe shudder with flaps locked down. When the airplane's tires contacted the 2,300-foot soft soil air-strip at Fort Smith in Canada's Northwest Territories, airspeed indicated 100 mph. Three waiting truck drivers watched what they expected would be a routine rollout.

"As we had already thrown up a considerable amount of mud, I decided to go around again and attempt another landing," reported Hill to USAAF headquarters. "At this point, I applied full throttle; we managed to pull through the water in front of us and had almost become airborne when we struck a still larger and softer area. The speed of the aircraft by this time was 50 to 60 mph."

The truckers witnessed the Norseman's left wheel drop into a hole and abruptly pivot before thumping upside-down in a splash of mud-colored water. Hill had misjudged wind from laundry rippling beside a sheltered mess hall. No one that day likely knew that the prototype Norseman underwent a maiden flight on November 14, 1935, near Montreal, Quebec. Designed to handle the slams and bangs of wilderness, the first of 903 produced immediately went to work in Quebec hinterland. Prototype CF-AYO hauled cargo from cucumbers to perfumed prostitutes into mining or lumber camps; outbound, pilots rode wrapped in the rancid odors of baled furs and perspiration-soaked northern workers.