On several occasions over the past couple of weeks, a pair of low flying fighter jets have buzzed Jasper National Park, raising eyebrows and questions from residents.
A public affairs officer for CFB Cold Lake confirmed military aircraft were flying in the area on March 18, but he was unable to confirm other sightings.
“I checked with our wing operations folks and they confirmed that we had two CT-155 Hawks transiting from Cold Lake down to Calgary and they might have diverted into Jasper to do some mountain training,” said Mathew Strong, a public affairs officer for 4 Wing Cold Lake.
“If there is public concern as to our operations in the area people can be reassured that it is completely normal. We use the area for training on a regular basis and it’s all done completely transparently and with safety top of mind.”
Strong said Jasper sits in the middle of the western edge of a low flying area that the Royal Canadian Air Force regularly uses to conduct training.
“It’s not out of the ordinary that they would be flying in that area,” said Strong.
“They transit through there all the time to go back and forth between Comox and Cold Lake, and other areas in the Canadian Rockies, so it’s very possible that either a CT-155 Hawk or a CF-18 Hornet was flying in the area.”
He also raised the possibility that it could have also been a pair of American F-16s transiting between the continental U.S. and Alaska.
“Canada does not fly the F-16 at all, so if it was an F-16, in fact, it definitely wasn’t one of ours,” said Strong.
“I won’t speculate about what they could have possibility been doing.”
Strong said if there were any regulations around low-flying aircraft operating above a national park the military would adhere to them.
“If there were rules and regulations against this then we would take those into consideration when we’re planning our flight profiles and I can assure you that our pilots were flying within the prescribed rules and regulations for the area,” said Strong.
Parks Canada did not provide a comment for this story.
Paul Clarke
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