On Monday(Nov. 18, 2013) we went again to the Abbotsford airport. This time we visited the fire fighting company ConAir, one of the biggest in the world. With three Hangars they were one of the bigger companies on the airport. What I thought was interesting, was that they didn't used the fuselage for the water tank, but attached an extra tank to the fuselage. Then to safe weight they removed everything not being part of the essential fuselage structure, like seats or the floor.
After it we went to the WestJet terminal There we saw first the maintenance side of the airport. With clearing the runways from snow, ice, or other obstacles, fire fighting, cutting grass, and all these things, there were quite a lot task for only a few people.
In the end we then got a view into the management. It was interesting that only a little part of the airport income actually came from landing taxes, also the 7 daily Westjet flights caused six of the eight million income of the airport. Most of this came from other businesses in the Westjet terminal, like restaurants or car rentals, or advertisement in the terminal, or from pay parking. Then there were also one part coming from berry fields, something that has "absolutely no relation to aviation." This income splitting the manager showed us really showed me that sometimes you have to think way out of the box to find the best possibility.
