Monty..

Ahhhhh Yellowknife..

Back when I was a lad and serving member as an Airforce Construction engineer(Mechanical Systems)the Yellowknife float plane dock was just a spit of rock..blasted and rolled flat and the RCMP and MOT float planes were refueled by hand..with a wobble pump and 45 gallon drums of fuel..

It was deemed by the powers that be at the time that the Canadian Forces,as was usual , would provide a refueling facility on the dock..

So a concrete containment dam of adequate size,possibly 5000 Imp gallons(my memory is too riddled by the grape)to remember the actual number ,was constructed and poured and the following,month Portee flew in a Herc,from Namiao,Edmonton ,with a crew of construction engineers and installed a pre fab stand..2000 gallon tank..and a gas driven motorized,explosion proof pump,and installed the new refueling facilities..There was no power there ,hence the high stand that the fuel would flow by gravity and pump down to the dock to refuel the float planes..mainly twin otters..

The piping was temporary that we installed and ran surface to the dock from the white building show in the picture..I possibly think it may be the little white building pictured..because none of the buildings were there is '76 when I was lead hand on my little engineering project.

The piping was trenched and buried by a local contractor across the parking lot after we installed the original ..as we didn't have the crew with us to trench and blast the solid rock the base is sitting on..

The last time I saw this installation ..the fuel tank was sitting on a high steel stand in a concrete containment dam with an explosion proof pump and a bunch of piping running across down to the dock to refuel the plane in the water as shown here..

The rest of the dock was flat crushed rock...bare as a baby's bum..nary a building to be seen..

So that is my mark left on Yellowknife..

Still got my certificate of brother of the raven or what ever it was from the Bar in Yellow knife..and some great stories and memories..what more could a guy want.,.?

Here is a link of the site as it is today..My refueling tank is ,I believe in the little white building shown..

http://static.panoramio.com/photos/original/14133294.jpg

Lot of gold taken out of the Yellowknife area and this is my New Years story to keep you entertained while we wait for the new trading year to start..Good luck to all in 2010

Portee

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