The first look inside the new home of the Royal Aviation Museum of Western Canada

WINNIPEG -

For the first time in years, a Beechcraft Musketeer aircraft is lifting off the ground. The flight is a short one – just to the second floor of the brand new Royal Aviation Museum of Western Canada.

"This is a huge responsibility, and it's exciting at the same time," said Dale Tallas, president of Almont Industrial, the company responsible for moving the plane.

The Beechcraft Musketeer is one of many being moved into the new home of the Royal Aviation Museum of Western Canada.

The museum officially took possession of the new building about a week ago. Now the planes are being moved into their modern and spacious new home on the campus of Winnipeg James Armstrong Richardson International Airport.

"We still have amazing aircraft, in fact, we have even better aircraft. Aircraft we haven't displayed before," said Terry Slobodian, the president and CEO of the museum.

"But it's going to be the stories that have people spellbound and keep coming back."

And to see some of those stories, visitors will have to look up. There will be six aircraft hanging from the museum's ceiling.

To hoist the heavy aircraft into the sky once more, the museum consulted with the Smithsonian Museum in the United States to get advice, along with a museum in London to learn how they suspend their planes.

In the end, it was a Winnipeg-based engineer who found a way to do it safely here both for visitors and the planes themselves.

"You want to hang it in such a way that you don't destroy the artifact," said Slobodian. "Because it's an item of history."

A history that is almost ready for visitors to experience once again.

The Royal Aviation Museum of Western Canada will reopen its doors to the public in March 2022.