The Snowbirds’ final flight is the footnote to a soaring legacy

With the teams warming up at Calgary’s McMahon Stadium and Sarah McLachlan getting ready to come out and sing O Canada, the nine-jet demonstration team will be preparing at Calgary’s airport. They’ll get into the sky early, then hold just far enough from the stadium not to be seen, but close enough to make a one-minute run-in once they get word via radio from co-ordinators on the ground.

Major Maciej (Match) Hatta, this year’s team lead, piloting Snowbird 1, will be at the front of the formation flypast. His view will be different from when he flew on the wing into the 2013 Grey Cup in Regina and saw flashing lights from the stadium below reflecting off the jets in from of him. He doesn’t want to give away too many surprises, but says the Snowbirds hope to make two passes by the stadium this time. The sunset timing could help make the whole scene a real beauty.

“The bottom of the jets will be nicely kind of sunlit if there aren’t clouds to hamper that,” said Major Hatta.

Seen by millions live at thousands of air shows as ambassadors of the Canadian Armed Forces since 1971, that’s where the military aerobatics team has showcased its capabilities: Intricate formations and heart-stopping solo passes, all choreographed to perfection with minimal space between the aircraft.

“I think what most people resonate with is hey, this was a Canadian-made aircraft that we’ve flown for so long,” Major Hatta said. “We’re excited to have one last opportunity to showcase the Canadian ambassador role we have as Snowbirds, and the jet one last time overhead.”

Flypasts at sporting events have been in addition to their busy air show schedules and something totally different – thundering over a packed stadium in formation, timed to the second so their dramatic arrival sets the tone for a big game. If the team hits the mark perfectly, they’ll hear “SHACK” on the radio from their co-ordinator below. Those dozens of quick flypasts in their 55-year history, on live television, have made the Snowbirds part of the fabric of Canadian sports – and fondly remembered by those involved. The Snowbirds team members often land after the flypast then are brought to the stadium to enjoy the event live. Their teamwork is admired.

The squadron from Moose Jaw has been invited to whoosh through the skies over marquee events: For Olympic opening ceremonies, outdoor NHL games, the PGA’s Canadian Open, F1 races and Grey Cups. They were overhead at Toronto’s Nathan Phillips Square for the Raptors’ 2019 NBA championship parade and at BMO Field for Canada’s first-ever FIFA World Cup game on home soil.

“It certainly is a dramatic way to open up a game, and great for the show, as they come through they represent everything that the military is with that great precision,” said Glen Suitor, a Grey Cup-winning CFL player turned TSN broadcaster who has been in the stadium for several Snowbirds flypasts.

Suitor likes the moment he sees the aircraft coming through the sky on his monitor and the producer tells them to wrap up and let the pictures of their flypast take the spotlight.

“I want to soak it in … the pride wells up in my chest. There’s nothing I could say that would add to it – the Snowbirds flying across, the emotion of players’ faces, the Canadian flag, ready for kickoff at the Grey Cup. It’s so patriotic.”

McMahon Stadium has seen other memorable Snowbirds flypasts over the years, including the 1988 Calgary Winter Olympics opening ceremonies, just after the cauldron was lit.

By request from Games organizers, they flew past trailing smoke in the five colours of the Olympic rings. But it wasn’t a smooth ride on that cold February day.

“It was a very challenging flypast,” recalled Lieutenant-Colonel (retired) Darryl Shyiak, who debuted as a Snowbirds pilot in 1988, and was also, years later, the team leader.

“We were getting our teeth rattled pretty good, because of the winds over the mountains creating what’s called mountain waves and making the air very bumpy for aircraft.”

One Snowbird was gripping the stick so hard that he inadvertently turned his smoke off, so only eight jets had the colours. Shyiak noted the global audience in his pilot’s logbook: “2.8 billion people saw us.”

The Snowbirds appeared at the 1976 Montreal Olympics too, some Calgary Stampedes in the seventies and the 1978 Commonwealth Games in Edmonton, with Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II in attendance.

In 1980, ABC’s Wide World of Sports did a feature TV story about the Snowbirds. They did flypasts at auto races, like the 1989 Molson Indy at Toronto’s Exhibition Place, where the team also attended a reception with the drivers, watched the race live in the stands, and got to meet and swap stories with the winner, Michael Andretti.

“He thought the Snowbirds were crazy, and we knew that he was crazy as a race car driver,” said former Snowbird commanding officer and team leader Dan Dempsey. “Every show was special, obviously, but the flypasts led to a lot of great memories for many Snowbirds team members.”

The Snowbirds have a rich history with the Canadian Football League, providing game-opening flypasts at 13 Grey Cups, flying over a festival and parade at two more, plus a handful of other CFL games.

The tradition of flypasts at the Grey Cup came from a dinner Dempsey attended for the 1990 game in Vancouver. Winnipeg Blue Bombers general manager Cal Murphy told him he’d love to have the Snowbirds fly over the 1991 Grey Cup, which Winnipeg was set to host.

At the time, Dempsey was being promoted to executive assistant to the commander of the Air Force, Lieutenant-General Fred Sutherland. Dempsey brought him the idea, and he authorized it instantly.

It set up the first of many Snowbirds flypasts at Grey Cups. On Nov. 24, 1991, between the Toronto Argonauts and Calgary Stampeders, their flypast came on the closing notes of the anthem by Winnipeg rock legend Burton Cummings. The Snowbirds thundered over the 52,000 fans at Winnipeg Stadium who were bundled in blankets and snowmobile suits to watch one of coldest CFL championship games on record – a bone-chilling minus-18 C at kickoff.

It’s a friendly tradition to covertly place your squadron’s crest in the form of a sticker – or “zapper” – on interesting or hard-to-reach places, to show you’ve been there. An epic zapping took place at that ’91 Grey Cup, involving John Candy, then a co-owner of the Argonauts. The story goes that a member of the Snowbirds ground crew gifted the Canadian movie star a Snowbirds ball cap and planted a team sticker on his coat.

Indeed, CBC broadcast footage of that game shows Candy cheering the Argos on the sidelines wearing the recognizable red sticker on his chest, and a navy Snowbirds hat, topped off with woolly earmuffs.

Another legendary sticker moment took place at the 2007 Grey Cup – and it was only one of the things that made that Snowbirds appearance fascinating. The game took place at Toronto’s Rogers Centre – a domed stadium – so they did a flypast nearby a little earlier, cleared to fly 500 feet over the fans gathered ahead of the game, but between tall buildings.

“It felt like I was flying in the Star Wars Canyon or something,” said Rob (Scratch) Mitchell, Snowbirds team lead that year. “We were in this diamond formation, the iconic nine plane formation, and our most manoeuverable one, that’s why I chose it. I said to the team, ‘Keep it tight, boys,’ because I didn’t want anybody wide as we were going through these buildings.”

The Snowbirds were invited inside for the game, and Mitchell was asked to award the Grey Cup alongside Minister of Defence Peter McKay and two RCMP officers.

Just as the trophy was about to be awarded on the field to the victorious Saskatchewan Roughriders, Mitchell inconspicuously slipped a small Snowbirds sticker on the underside of the Grey Cup – something he thought would be discovered much later, long after the confetti fell. But he forgot that players hoist that large silver chalice sideways. So when the Riders thrust the trophy into the air, cameras captured it instantly – and in clear focus on the stadium videoboard and to the millions of TV viewers. He grinned reluctantly at Minister McKay.

His Blackberry began buzzing in his pocket from other Snowbirds and friends in the Forces, wowed by the moment.

“The good news story of this is the Roughriders saw the humour in it, and so did the CFL,” said Lt.-Col. Mitchell (retired), “and in fact, a nice testament to the relationship between the Snowbirds, and their Saskatchewan connection is they kept the sticker on the entire time that they had the Cup, as it travelled to schools and events.”

Lt.-Col. (retired) Maryse Carmichael saw the zapper from home on TV and thought, “well done.” She flew past her first Grey Cup in 2000, just months after being named the first female Snowbirds pilot. She later also became a commanding officer.

She keeps a photo of the Snowbirds’ appearance at the debut of the CFL’s Ottawa Renegades in 2002. She enjoyed trading stories with athletes they met over the years, like NHL goalie Ed Staniowski, who had both a military and hockey background.

She notes the close-knit bond between the Snowbirds and players from the Moose Jaw’s Western Hockey League team, the Warriors – a club that today has a Snowbirds-inspired logo.

“They have that teamwork, and the Snowbirds have the same thing, flying two metres from wingtip to wingtip. You need the trust,” said Carmichael. “You need to understand what your teammates are doing, and you need to have that passion, which I think is such a link with the fans, with the players, and with the team.”

This will be the fourth sports flypast of 2026 for the Snowbirds. They opened their 55th season at the Canadian Grand Prix in Montreal on May 24. Despite drizzle and poor visibility, their arrival before the Formula 1 race was exquisitely timed, zooming over Circuit Gilles Villeneuve in perfect sync with a choir’s final flourish to O Canada.

“From our holding place – four miles or one minute away – I could not see the track that day,” said Major Hatta. “So we were going off GPS points and things like that.”

While in Montreal, they also flew past while Canadiens fans were entering Bell Centre for the NHL’s Eastern Conference final playoff series with the Carolina Hurricanes.

In June, the Snowbirds thundered over BMO Field as Canada opened its FIFA World Cup 2026 campaign against Bosnia & Herzegovina. It was Canada’s first-ever home World Cup on home soil – another nation-making moment with the Snowbirds overhead.

Their schedule of events had already been set when the government announced in May that the CT-114 Tutor jet would be retired after this season and then go on pause. Many Snowbirds personnel will go to other units in the RCAF. But the 2026 Snowbirds did their best to visit as much of Canada as they could. They had sold-out crowds, long autograph lines, fans lining fences at airports and sending them tribute messages.

“People of all walks of life, from infancy to old age, have seen this aircraft, and it means something to them,” said current Snowbirds pilot Captain Brendan Pellow, who already knows his next post will be flying search and rescue.

“Between all of our flights, our shows … I think we can walk away with our heads held high, saying we did the best to demonstrate what this Tutor and this team can do, representing the Canadian Armed Forces and Canada itself.”