Herbert Hopson

Herbert Hopson was born in Blandford, Dorset, England, on December 2, 1909. His family moved to Calgary in 1912 and in 1929 he commenced flying training at Great Western Airways, operated by Fred McCall and Jock Palmer.

On April 4, 1930, he obtained his Commercial Pilot's Certificate and began instructing as well as barnstorming with an 0X5 Waco. In 1932 he attended an instrument flying course at Camp Borden Military Base, Ontario, and later helped Jock Palmer train Chinese students to fly so they could join the Cantonese forces to help to defend their homeland.

Until 1937 Hopson continued with occasional flying jobs but had to make a living by working in an engine-rebuilding firm. That year he renewed his Instructor's Certificate and received an 'A' rating, rare in Canada at that time. Leigh Brintnell offered him a position with his firm, Mackenzie Air Service, based in Edmonton, Alberta. Hopson spent two years with Mackenzie Air flying Fairchild 71's and 82's and Noorduyn Norseman aircraft.

In March 1939, he joined Trans-Canada Airlines (TCA) and within four months was promoted to Captain. In September he was transferred to Toronto flying Lockheed 14's and 18's and helped set up new routes to Moncton, New Brunswick, to London and Windsor, Ontario, and to New York.

Hopson was promoted to Check Pilot in 1943 and to Chief Pilot a year later. In 1945 he introduced the Douglas DC-3 to TCA service. From 1946 to 1952, he was on loan, part-time, to the Department of Transport (DOT) to assist in the implementation of the Instrument Landing System (ILS). TCA provided a DC-3 and a radio engineer to assist the DOT technicians. They covered all major airports to be commissioned with ILS, from Victoria, British Columbia, to St. John's, Newfoundland. With this experience, Hopson became a member of the International Air Transport Association (IATA) Flight Technical Committee to define requirements for instrument landing systems. The standards they set became the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) International Standard.

With the adoption of ILS it became imperative that High Intensity Lighting be developed. As a member of IATA and Technical Advisor to ICAO, Hopson helped to establish International Standards for High Intensity Approach, Threshold, and Runway Lighting Systems. This was followed by work to develop the In-Runway Lighting Systems used with Category 2-ILS and Category 3-ILS.

From 1947 to his retirement in 1969, Hopson filled the position of Technical Assistant, Test Pilot and, eventually, Director of Flight Operations, Technical Development for TCA/Air Canada. He was responsible for the coordination of company recommendations to the government regarding construction of runways, aprons, lighting and navigation aids. He assisted in selection of new aircraft, flight deck layouts, etc., during the era of the Lockheed Super Constellation, Vickers Viscount and Vanguard, Douglas DC-8 and DC-9, Boeing 747 and Lockheed 1011. During this time, he was responsible for all of Air Canada's Route and Airplane Operating Manuals and Route Operating Certificates. He flew TCA's first Viscount on cold weather trials at Churchill, Manitoba, and also flew the first Vickers Vanguard.

With the proposed introduction of supersonic aircraft, Hopson became a member of the IATA Supersonic Operations Requirements Committee. In the final development stages within ICAO, he was accredited to the Canadian delegation and given freedom to act on behalf of Canada in final decision making.

After retirement from Air Canada at the end of 1969, he spent several years consulting for an air planning services firm working on Short Take-Off and Landing/Vertical Take-Off and Landing (STOL/VTOL) with Jack Dyment, and for a manufacturing firm developing area navigation systems, fibre optic instrumentation, weight and balance systems, etc.

In 1947 Herbert Hopson became on of TCA's 'Million Milers', pilots who have flown over one million miles (1.6 million km) at the controls of a company aircraft. This adds up to some interesting figures: it's roughly equal to 40 times around the equator, of more than 6,000 hours in the air.

Hopson died on August 25, 1993.

Herbert Hopson was inducted as a Member of Canada's Aviation Hall of Fame in 1989 at a ceremony held in Edmonton, Alberta.