Peterborough Chapter - The Avro Arrow Mystery

Speaker: Scarlett Janusas

Topic: The Avro Arrow Mystery

The Arrow airplane was the fastest jet interceptor plane developed by Canada in the 1950s. Its cancellation by Prime Minister Diefenbaker remains a mystery to this day, as its cancellation was not simply a stop to the project, but an order for destruction of all planes, models, prototypes, blueprints, etc. The only remaining tangible evidence of the program was thought to be the 9 models fired into Lake Ontario from Point Petre Range in Prince Edward County.

The search for these elusive models was undertaken by many, but the most recent search, by OEX Search and Recovery Group, has the best chance of finding at least one of these models. In 2018, one of the early delta tracking vehicles was raised from the bottom of Lake Ontario and provides the first real insight into the program. This talk will present videos of the project and discuss the conservation of the delta tracking vehicle, and next steps in the 2019 and 2020 field seasons.

Scarlett Janusas owns the archaeological consulting firm of Scarlett Janusas Archaeology Inc., which conducts both land and underwater archaeological projects across the province of Ontario. In addition to being the project archaeologist for the Raise the Arrow project which started in 2017, Scarlett and her staff have conducted archaeological surveys for the Highway 407 extension. (See photo below).

This presentation is made possible through the support of the City of Peterborough and the Trent U. Archaeological Research Centre. Members of the public are invited free of charge. For further information contact the chapter secretary, Dirk Verhulst, at dverhulst@cogeco.ca.