Grey Cup game bids farewell for now to iconic Snowbirds aerial team

CALGARY — The national anthem is set to ring through McMahon Stadium on Sunday and herald across the sky nine Snowbirds jets, in a fitting show retiring the planes of Canada’s military aerial ambassadors.

The CFL’s Grey Cup championship game will be the last time the Snowbirds fly in their CT-114 Tutor jets for a scheduled public spectacle.

Capt. Marc-André Plante, who flies as Snowbird 8 on the team, says it’s the perfect sendoff.

“It is Canada’s demonstration team. It’s Canada’s football league. It’s like all these things just kind of make sense, when you look at it where we just celebrate Canada as a whole,” he said in an interview.

The Snowbirds, based out of the 15 Wing Air Force base at Moose Jaw, Sask., have never flown anything but the Tutors.

They have performed roughly 2,700 times for more than 140 million people across North America in more than a half-century of service.

At the end of the year, the Tutors are to be retired and will eventually be replaced by the CT-157 Siskin II. The team is expected to be temporarily grounded until the early 2030s.

But on Sunday, the team will soar.

The jets are to set off from the Calgary International Airport and zoom over the stadium as close to their minimum flight height of about 150 metres from the tallest point that they’re flying over, creating a memorable chorus of ooohs and ahhhs.

As celebrated Canadian musician Sarah McLachlan finishes her final note of O Canada, the jets are to roar over the stadium one last time.

Plante and his squadron will then return to the airport, tuck the planes into a hangar and bus to the stadium to watch the rest of the game.

The team will later head home to Saskatchewan on Monday.

“Of course, as we’re flying back to Moose Jaw, if we have sufficient gas, we’ll probably do a little flyover of our hometown as we are coming in.

“But as far as an invited assembly of persons, (the Grey Cup) would be our last.”

The official retirement plan, and the future of the planes, is outside of the crew’s control, Plante added.

He said the federal government’s announcement in May hasn’t changed his last few months flying with the squad.

If anything, the team has tried to fly over as many towns and cities as gas and time allowed, he said.

Flying with the Snowbirds has been the highest honour so far in his military career, said Plante.

“Being able to inspire hundreds, thousands of Canadians across Canada to pursue their own forms of excellence — whatever that may be, whether or not it’s joining the military or doing anything else that’s contributing to Canada — I think is an amazing thing to do.”

For Snowbirds enthusiast William Gilson, the flyover will be historic and memorable.

“This flight over the Grey Cup on Sunday is really going to be, I feel, the end of a very important part of my life and an important chapter in Canadian military history.”

It’s a shame the team will be grounded for the next several years, he said.

“So I want to be there.”

Gilson, from Calgary, is a full-time teacher and a military aviation photographer. He estimates he has taken about 10,000 to 15,000 photos of the Snowbirds and expects to add another few hundred to his photo library Sunday.

He said he’s skeptical that Snowbirds will return after being grounded. Petitions have also been circulating to keep the Snowbirds in the sky, including one brought to the House of Commons with more than 2,000 signatures.

Gilson’s love of aviation was born out of his family’s military background and the high-flying stunts of the Snowbirds.

He was 11 when he saw them perform at the airport in Abbotsford, B.C., in 1972. He went to shows every year after, until just recently.

“They’re not overly powerful but demonstrate the true thing to be Canadian: calm, cool, collected, thinking with a smart head.”

Gilson said his camera is going to be perched Sunday on a toboggan hill just southwest of the stadium when the red-and-white birds fly overhead.

He expects to be joined by several hundred other aviation enthusiasts — and maybe some of his family.

His daughter recently called him and asked when he started to become interested in airplanes. His three-year-old granddaughter has said she loves them too.

“It’s just in my blood and it’s in the family’s blood, I guess.”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 14, 2026.

Dayne Patterson, The Canadian Press