North Bay City Councillor Mike Anthony is looking into the news that Bombardier is selling the rights to its water bomber aircraft design to a B.C. company that is planning to build the aircraft in Calgary and according to reports, create as many as 900 new jobs in Southern Alberta.
The Bombardier aircraft was producing the internationally renowned water bomber here in North Bay from 1999 until April of 2016. After an up and down market, which dropped after 9-11, Bombardier finally announced they were leaving North Bay in October of 2015.
See that story here: Bombardier pulls out
A citizen reached out to Anthony on Wednesday night wondering how North Bay let this big company get away.
“My research showed me the company called Viking, that purchased the rights or the design for the water bomber aircraft from Bombardier, are centred out West. I think it’s in B.C. and they already have a facility in Calgary with 100 people is my understanding. So you would understand why they would hope to bring it to their end of the things,” said Anthony about Viking looking to build the aircraft in Calgary.
“I guess the question is anything that we could do here to be pro-active either to try and keep some of that work, show what we can do for Viking and to see, in case we are not successful, what do we do to back fill. So those are all the steps that you need to be on top of,” added Anthony.
Bombardier employed as many as 65 at the North Bay hangar which is now been taken over by Voyageur Airways, who still owns the large hangar next to Jack Garland Airport.
Anthony has put in a call to the North Bay Economic Development office to find out more details about the Bombardier departure and perhaps see if the business could not come back here some day.
“Basically I believe anything Calgary can do, North Bay can do too, sometimes better. It might be David versus Goliath but I think that’s why it’s worth looking into this and seeing anything we can do to promote ourselves, whether it’s to Viking, and to be involved in this and be pro-active because I think our city can match up to any other city. In today’s connected world it’s not always just the biggest,” said Anthony.
“I don’t know the geography of Calgary all that well but I know they have a facility in Calgary and maybe we can show them there is still reason to be doing business here in North Bay, that would be my hope.”
