MLU FORUM - RCAF Station MacDonald

This wartime BCATP facility was located about one hour Northwest of Winnipeg, Manitoba and served as No. 3 Bombing and Gunnery School during World War 2. It closed in the Spring of 1945. Andrew Mynarski VC trained there in 1942 as an Air Gunner.

Shortly after the base closed in 1945, it was taken over by War Assets Disposal, the predecessor of todays Crown Assets, and became a storage disposal site for surplus military equipment. My Father-in-Law, who had trained at Shilo, Manitoba for the Pacific Force, was assigned to the MacDonald site after the war as part of a military group charged with taking in the arriving surplus equipment and supervising it's sale and disposal. The bulk of the equipment arrived at a railway siding just west of the base, where it was offloaded and either driven or towed to the base. The exception was the first of three phases of equipment arrivals (aircraft) which were flown in from various other locations across Manitoba and Saskatchewan. The aircraft arrived until there was no space left for them to land, and they were lined up in rows along the hanger line and all three runways. Most of the aircraft my Father-in-law recalls seeing there were, Lysanders, Bolingbrokes, Fairey Battles and a handful of Hurricanes. When the aircraft were sold, the buyers arrived with their paperwork and their plane was towed to the gate. There, the new owner had to remove the wheels before taking it away. This policy only lasted a few weeks as it was a complete pain for everyone involved. The Bolingbrokes were apparently the most popular with the local area farmers. They would take them home, strip off the engines, outer wings and nose. The open nose would be capped and the fuselage tipped up onto the newly capped nose, turning it into a grain storage bin.

When the bulk of the aircraft had been sold off, the second phase of surplus started: the arrival of military vehicles. The same process on arrival was undertaken, with the runways and ramps filled with vehicles of all sorts for sale. The attached photo is from the winter of 1945/46 looking slightly Northeast across the base. Larger trucks can be seen lined up along the ramp in front of the hangers with smaller vehicles lining the two visible runways and turning corner. The photo is courtesy of Airforce Magazine.

The last phase of surplus at RCAF MacDonald was the arrival and disposal of artillery. This consisted largely (no pun intended) of 3.7" antiaircraft, 25-pdr and another medium piece my Father-in-law could not recall coming in as rolling stock. It was all sold for scrap to various mills in Selkirk, Manitoba and each delivery was accompanied by some military personal who has to inspect the appropriate demilling on the equipment. There were also deliveries of 40mm Bofors guns either as rolling stock or crated. The rolling stock was stored outside and sold for scrap. The crated pieces were stored in No. 6 Hanger at MacDonald (the large one, second row upper right in the photo). Along with them was a large delivery of crated Orlikon 20mm cannons. This crated equipment was only stored for a few months and then shipped back down East somewhere.

The Base was reopened in 1951 and ran in various capacities until the Spring of 1959 when it closed for good. It served a few years as a Sports Car Racetrack and was finally sold to a Hutterite Colony in the late 1970's and the entire site is now back under the plow. The only remains relate to the large concrete pad the hangers once stood on. and a handful of original roads.