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Wings & Wheels Heritage Festival to feature helicopter fly-in

The Festival provides aviation and automobile fans with a rare opportunity to view aircraft and classic cars up close, in the heart of Toronto, Canada's largest city.

Aircraft and helicopters will fly into Downsview Airport throughout the weekend, and classic car and motorcycle clubs and vehicle owners from throughout southern Ontario will participate in a two-day "Show & Shine" event.

"There is definitely a lot of interest in helicopters from festival visitors and the growing Toronto helicopter community is interested developing an annual social event and showcase, " said Kenneth Swartz, a board member of the Canadian Air & Space Museum. "May 20 was the 70th anniversary of Igor Sikorsky's first free flight of the VS-300 helicopter, which gives us an important industry milestone to celebrate."

There is no change to participate in the helicopter fly-in, and all crew and passengers receive free admission to the Festival. Indoor exhibit space in a large hangar is available, at an additional charge.

Previous festivals have attracted up to 10,000 people, 90 fly-in aircraft of all types and 150 classic vehicles, with attendance growing each year. Previous helicopter visitors have included Bell 47G, JetRanger, LongRanger, 222B, CH-146 Griffon, Eurocopter 350B-2 and TwinStar and MD520N helicopters.

Downsview Airport is privately-owned by Bombardier Aerospace, which builds the Bombardier Global 5000 and Global XLS ultra-long-range business jets and the Q400 turboprop airliner in Toronto.

Since production flight test activity will take place throughout the festival weekend, ALL fly-in aircraft, including helicopters, must pre-register on the http://wingsandwheelsfestival.com web site, at the request of Bombardier.