Sandra Seaward wants it made known the North Atlantic Aviation Museum is still in the community and it’s still vitally important to the town of Gander (Newfoundland & Labrador). Located on the Trans Canada Highway in Gander, near the Tourism Information Centre, the museum tracks the history of the Gander International Airport, and houses countless pieces of historic memorabilia, like a piece of steel from the World Trade Centre.
However, since it has been around for so long, Ms. Seaward said it’s only natural for residents of Gander to not notice the aircrafts scattered around the museum’s property.
“Believe it or not, the planes that are in our yard, people don’t notice them. It’s pretty amazing,” said Ms. Seaward with a chuckle. “We are a museum and we’ve been here for a long time. I guess people in the local area, like anywhere else, when you see it everyday you tend to not notice it, and it kind of blends in with the background of the town. We want to bring this to everyone’s attention again.”
To help bring it to the attention of the people — both tourists and locals — Ms. Seaward, the executive director at the North Atlantic Aviation Museum, recently welcomed a group of players in the tourism industry to the newly-renovated museum.
The main goal of having these players tour the museum was to make sure they left impressed, and they went back spreading the word about the North Atlantic Aviation Museum.
“We thought it would be a good idea to bring in some people from (the tourism) industry, particularly frontline people. These are the people that talk to the tourists as they’re coming through, and it’s pretty difficult to give people a head’s up where to go if they don’t know what it is,” said Ms. Seaward. “Not only can they say, ‘You can drop by the aviation museum,’ but they can also tell the tourists some of the things they can see and do here because they’ve seen it firsthand. It’s a lot different when you know what you’re talking about.
“We had a complete renovation job done last spring, and this will be our first full season with the renovations. It’s a world-class display. It’s definitely worth seeing.”
According to the executive director, the tourism players were “really, really pleased” with the tour and what they saw at the local museum, and everybody got around the museum and tested and saw and touched everything they could.
Now, she hopes they spread the word about the museum, and more people — both tourists and locals — stop by to see what they have to offer.
Newfoundland Aviation museum still relevant