Avro Canada and the VZ-9 Avrocar

For the most part, Canadian aircraft manufacturers have produced the kinds of aircraft one might expect from a northern country with vast, rugged wilderness, harsh winters, and a large number of unimproved airstrips.

Aircraft like the Noorduyn Norseman, and the Found FBA-2 , and the iconic deHavilland Canada DHC-2 Beaver have established Canada as a legendary producer of tough, capable bushplanes that are just as comfortable on skis or floats as they are on wheels.

That same rugged, Canadian bushplane DNA has even extended to transport-category aircraft, in the form of the deHavilland Canada DHC-6 Twin Otter, DHC-7 Dash-7, and DHC-8 Dash-8…all designed to carry airline passengers into short, challenging airstrips.

Indeed, if these aircraft manufacturers were people, we might expect to see burly, bearded lumberjack-types dressed in flannel and ready to take on the remote wilderness.

But not all Canadian aircraft manufacturers have always fit this mold, least of all the Avro Canada Corporation.

While other Canadian manufacturers were focused on servicing remote airstrips and hauling goods into and out of the frozen north, Avro Canada instead focused on developing things like fighter jets, supersonic interceptors, the world’s first jet airliners, and this bizarre creation, the VZ-9 Avrocar.

A VZ-9 Avrocar on display at the National Museum of the USAF in Dayton, Ohio

First flown in 1959, resembling a flying saucer, and developed in secret with the US military, the Avrocar was developed as an experimental proof-of-concept vertical takeoff and landing (VTOL) vehicle. It was powered by three Continental J69 jet engines (as in the Cessna T-37 Tweet jet trainer), which expelled air through ducts and then through edge nozzles for control.

Basic anatomy of the Avrocar.

An overhead view of an Avrocar. Note the joint USAF/US Army markings on either half, and the anti-glare black paint ahead of each cockpit.

Avro Canada and the US Air Force initially envisioned the Avrocar as a high-performance fighter aircraft, capable of flight at 300 mph (483 km/h) and 10,000 feet (3,048m).

Unfortunately, it proved to be so inherently unstable, it was only ever able to achieve speeds of 35 mph (56 km/h) and an altitude of 3 feet (0.91 m).

An Avrocar undergoing a test flight.

Although the US Army showed interest in a modified Avrocar that might have served as a tactical hovercraft, the lackluster performance and persistent stability issues eventually led to the cancelation of the project in 1961.

While the failure of this one program might have been recoverable, the Canadian government’s cancelation of Avro Canada’s CF-105 Arrow program occurred only two years prior. These setbacks combined with others to ultimately cause the company to cease operations altogether in 1962.

But despite experiencing far more failures than successes in the market, the vision and energy demonstrated by Avro Canada was nothing short of legendary. After all, in a 16-year span, the company employed 50,000 people and developed aircraft ranging from the flying saucers to airliners to Mach 2 interceptors.

So while the other Canadian aircraft manufacturers might have resembled the aforementioned lumberjacks of the industry, Avro Canada might best be remembered as the starry-eyed science-fiction obsessed kid of the 1950s…a company whose business acumen paled in comparison to its innovation and enthusiasm for cutting-edge, futuristic aerospace concepts.