International pilots, media landing in North Bay this week

Over 100 pilots and media personnel from the United States and overseas will make a 24-hour stop in North Bay Thursday, as part of the International Air Rally.

The eight-day event will take flyers through three provinces from New Brunswick to Ontario, and the winners of the $30,000 grand prize will be tested on different skills including navigation, stress and endurance, mechanics, survival and first aid.

During their North Bay stop participants and media members will go on a guided tour of the NORAD underground facility, dine in the Canadore College aviation campus hangar, and take a cruise on the Chief Commanda II.

This year’s rally stop in North Bay will receive wide coverage, said Susan Church, general manager of the Blue Sky Economic Growth Organization, which is hosting the visit.

“We’ll have three journalists from the Kyodo News, Japan’s leading news agency coming, as well as Bill James, a freelance American journalist, Bernard Pichon, a Swiss TV host and journalist, a British journalist will also come to North Bay, and the publisher of AOPA Pilot magazine will also be here covering the event,” Church said.

As well CTV will produce a documentary about the rally.

“From an economic point of view, to have the pilots here, and more importantly the journalists, will give North Bay great exposure around the world,” Church said.

“When I read through some of the articles the journalists wrote about last year’s rally, I was astounded by how much they wrote about the actual communities they were in.”

It's rumoured the Discovery Channel may cover the rally as might National Geographic.