This is the third in a four-part series celebrating 100 years of the Royal Canadian Air Force.
Stu McIntosh had long considered a career in the Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF), and he imagined it would be as a pilot.
Growing up in Abbotsford and Mission meant he was a little boy who loved the Abbotsford Air Show. At the young age of 17 an eager McIntosh applied to his dream occupation, only to be told he did not have the eyesight requirements to be an RCAF pilot.
Disappointed but not deterred, McIntosh spent four years studying physics at Royal Roads Military College to become an aerospace engineer. After obtaining his degree he did the aerospace engineering officer course in Borden, Ont. where he finished top of his class.
McIntosh was hoping to come back home to B.C., but was instead rightly convinced to take a posting oversees to Four Wing, Baden-Soellingen, Germany. McIntosh was initially assigned as the line servicing officer at 409 Squadron, and was responsible for operational readiness of CF-18 Hornet fighter jets in support of the NATO mission at the end of the Cold War
"It should have been daunting, but it wasn't," McIntosh said. "You had good training and belief in yourself. You also had the belief that people had in you, which was probably even more important."
After only six months in Germany, Canada entered the first Gulf War. McIntosh's 409 squadron was the first to go down to Doha, Qatar as part of the coalition forces. Having never seen active war experience himself, a 22-year-old McIntosh and the experienced squadron warren officer selected the individuals who were going to deploy.
"It was an extreme learning experience - we had people in the office who were crying because they couldn't go, and I had other people crying because they didn't want to go," McIntosh said. "Some were deathly afraid of deploying, and this is not what I necessarily expected to happen. You had to deal with that and work people through and say 'this is what you have trained for; this is what we all signed up for.'"
McIntosh was a maintenance engineering officer during his three months in the Gulf, working primarily on the CF-18 fighter aircraft operations. The experience was only a short period of his four years posted in Germany, but it is one where he learned a lot about what it is like to serve in high-pressure situations.
"As a young officer I went off to the Gulf War, and it was a huge opportunity. I saw the best and the worst of people, and I learned immensely from it," McIntosh said.
After completing his post in Germany, he was selected to be a flight test engineer and was assigned for training at the Empire Test Pilots' School in the United Kingdom. While there, he was part of a class of 20 pilot and engineer students focused on learning to flight test and evaluate military aircraft.
He spent a hard 12 months in intense schooling, flying and report writing. The stressful moments were overcome with unique experiences, such as living in a 300-year-old mill house, playing rugby and getting to fly in over 20 different airplanes. Test pilots and flight test engineers worked together to evaluate designs of aircraft and make improvements.
Following completion of his training, he was posted to the Aerospace Engineering Test Establishment in Cold Lake, Alta. As a flight test engineer, this critical job meant being able to translate what needed to be improved on the aircraft, looking at the systems that enabled that capability, then working through the engineering that enabled those systems and putting that all together while leading teams of highly specialized subject matter experts.
His favourite job while in the air force was being a test engineer, specifically modernizing the CF-18 Hornet. He helped upgrade the CF-18s by incorporating capabilities for laser and infrared guided weapons, as well as the search, track and targeting systems necessary to employ these precision weapons from the aircraft.
"Working with some really great people in flight test we brought the F-18, in that time frame, back to state-of-the-art world-leading capabilities," McIntosh said.
After seven years doing flight testing and two years in the maintenance world he was ready for his high-flying final posting – the Canadian Forces Snowbirds.
From 2002 to 2006, McIntosh was assigned as the first deputy commanding officer of 431 Air Demonstration Squadron, He was responsible for overall leadership of the squadron while allowing the commanding officer to focus on safely flying as Snowbird One with the Air Demonstration Team.
McIntosh was meant to go back to Cold Lake into the test world after his final show season with the Snowbirds when he got approached by Bombardier. He was asked if he would run the NATO Flying Training in Canada program in Moose Jaw, Sask. He retired from the Air Force and took the job.
"I took off the uniform and worked side-by-side with the wing commander of Moose Jaw. He was responsible for the program from the military side, and I was responsible from the industry side," McIntosh said. "Our job was to produce pilots for Canada and for NATO nations."
After five years in that position, he was approached to come back to Abbotsford to work at Cascade Aerospace. He first ran operations, then the programs group, and has just recently become the executive vice president and chief operating officer. Cascade Aerospace is a specialty aerospace contractor focused on military, government and commercial customers and is a world leader on C-130 Hercules maintenance and engineering.
"It comes full circle. From being a little kid here and loving the airshow, an Air Force career, and then a civilian career that has brought me back here," McIntosh said.
McIntosh served 21 years in the Air Force. From Comox, Cold Lake, Germany, the Gulf and the UK, McIntosh's career was an adventure. Working at Cascade Aerospace has allowed McIntosh to settle down and raise his children alongside his spouse in the place he grew up and discovered his love for aviation. A career filled with many new destinations and varying positions, he has loved it all.
"I would do it all over again," McIntosh said. "It is a different lifestyle choice, but I got to see the world. I got to do all sorts of great things. I worked hard for all of it, but there were lots of opportunities."
ALSO SEE: Abbotsford’s Jim Reith enjoyed aviation career that included being a fighter pilot and Snowbird
ALSO SEE: Abbotsford’s Maggie Reith experienced rewarding career as a flight nurse
