Volunteers from the Jet Aircraft Museum disassemble jets in Cornwallis Park

Nova Scotia, Canada — Volunteers from the Jet Aircraft Museum are taking apart two jets that have stood proudly in Cornwallis Park since 1987 – symbols of the military history of the former CFB Cornwallis.

 

Some have lamented the loss of the airplanes and they are right to grieve these monuments – these physical reminders of the activity and lives and purpose that have been part of Cornwallis for decades.

 

However we must recognize that the Cornwallis Military Museum is doing the right thing by donating the planes to JAM – to a group with the expertise and means to look after these pieces of Canadian military and aeronautical history.

 

Left as they were, exposed to the salt air from the Annapolis Basin and in the care of a volunteer museum staff with lots of heart and but no funds and no training for the maintenance these planes require, the planes would slowly but surely have crumbled into rust.

 

Even now, as the volunteers from JAM examine the planes, they are hampered in their work by the universal corrosion of the aircraft.

 

Furthermore those who criticize the museum’s decision should ask themselves when they last gave a donation, let alone when they last had a tour of the museum’s interesting and informative displays. There is still much in the museum that records and echoes the history of Cornwallis.