Noticed some blue buildings around town?
You can thank the Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF) for that. In honour of its 100th anniversary, the RCAF has launched a campaign to celebrate the event and shine a light on the people past, present, and future who are making a positive impact on behalf of the organization. Trees for Life is collaborating with the RCAF on many commemorative plantings this year in honour of our shared history and future as we expand our mandate to all types of heroes, including first responders, health workers, the Military, and personal heroes.
The Illumination Campaign encourages people to shine an Air Force Blue light on buildings, landmarks, businesses, homes, and more, on April 1st, 2024, to honour the 100th Anniversary of the RCAF. Captain Aaron Niles, a Strategic Planner with the group and a colleague, sparked the idea. They saw it as a unique way to commemorate the people who have and continue to serve Canada and abroad, celebrate the RCAF centennial, and in recognition of the continued friendship between Canada and regions outside its borders.
Calgary Tower (Alberta)
Canada Place Sails of Light (Vancouver)
The Campaign began over a year ago, and Captain Niles is thrilled to report over 300 locations in 22 countries will participate with blue illumination on April 1st. They expect more countries and locations will join in the coming weeks. He recently learned the Allied Air Command out of Ramstein Air Base in Germany and the Stormont Northern Ireland Parliament Buildings will also join.
Closer to home, Captain Niles says we’ll see blue lights at landmarks such as the CN Tower in Toronto, the Calgary Tower, and the Canada Place Sails of Light on Vancouver’s waterfront, to name a few.
Motivated by the positive response, the inspiration struck to check the Guinness World Record listings. There is a record for illumination within 24 hours set in 2010 at 38 landmarks. As you might expect, Guinness has strict qualifying criteria, so the 300 or so locations that have committed won’t all contribute to the total, but the RCAF believes they have a good shot at a new record.
However, the campaign is about much more than setting records. The motivation behind it was to commemorate the Air Force Centennial and to instill pride in ownership of the Air Force through the collective engagement of Canadians. One of its main slogans is ‘Your Air Force”, a notion that underscores that every Canadian has some connection to the RCAF, personally or through friends or family, and that the achievements of the Air Force belong to all Canadians.
Captain Niles says his top two needs to know about the RCAF are:
The Air Force is a group of amazing individuals across many specialties including pilots and aircraft technicians, aerospace engineers, and logisticians, to name a few.
The RCAF services go far beyond the use of force. The work involves everything from humanitarian aid at home like flood rescue and fighting forest fires, to Haitian earthquake relief, to helping allied partners in the Caribbean combat illegal drug trade to leading training in Europe.
The RCAF invites Canadians and people everywhere to illuminate in Air Force Blue on April 1st and to share your story with them. If you’d like to register your participation and add your buildings to the list, please email Captain Niles at aaron.niles@forces.gc.ca.
You can learn more about the campaign here.