No. 41 Service Flying Training School & No. 8 Service Flying Training School (Weyburn):

by Bruce Forsyth (www.militarybruce.com), with permission

No. 41 SFTS opened on 5 January 1942 by the Royal Air Force near Weyburn as part of the British Commonwealth Air Training Plan, with a relief landing ield near Halbrite. The school closed on 22 January 1944.

No. 8 SFTS (RCAF) stood up in its place, but the school had a brief existence in Weyburn as it re-located to Moncton on 30 June 1944 and the station was abandoned. In two years of operation in Weyburn, the two schools graduated 1,055 pilots.

The aerodrome sat abandoned until the early 1950s when a medical facility for mentally handicapped children took over the former station’s buildings, remaining until 1957. Western Christian College then occupied the former aerodrome from 1957 until 1989.

The former station is now the Weyburn Airport. Two runways remain in operation, while runway 18/36 is abandoned.

All that remains of the former RCAF Detachment Halbrite is the faint outline of the runways.

Source material: City of Weyburn web site – http://city.weyburn.sk.ca/modules.php?name=Sections&op=viewarticle&artid=19, information provided by Vintage Wings – www.vintagewings.ca & information supplied by Cheryl Rommann, City Clerk, City of Weyburn (2004).

The following perished while serving at No. 41 SFTS:  T Benham, E Bibby, BT Bowden, AF Brown, J Burke, WEL Evans, EP Fairgrieve, GA Gardner, P Greenhalgh, AS Hall, WA Hughes, RW Maxwell, DJ Sharpe, AE Taylor, AWG Watson, H Whittaker and H Williams.

Memorial plaque