Short flights, empty planes dominate the last 30 days in PM's flight habits
Of the 17 flights logged by the prime minister over the past 30 days, 10 were for flights under an hour
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The prime minister of Canada’s jet flew empty from Toronto to Waterloo on Friday to bypass the hour’s drive to catch his flight home.
This was one of the highlights of the previous 30 days of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s travel — spanning 16,000 kilometres across 17 travel days.
Of those 17 flights, 10 lasted less than one hour.
The prime minister embarked on two separate cross-country tours while the house wasn’t in session throughout February and March.
The first tour kicked off Feb. 21 — less than a week after returning from last month’s CARICOM meeting in the Bahamas — taking him to Western Canada.
The PM’s most recent tour began on Sunday, March 12, with a 22-minute flight from Ottawa to Montreal to attend private meetings.
After a Monday spent delivering remarks and attending a town hall in Montreal, the prime minister flew an hour east to Halifax, where he toured a factory and made an announcement with Nova Scotia Premier Tim Houston.
Wednesday saw Trudeau fly an hour east to St. John’s for an another announcement and town hall, followed by a Thursday flight to Toronto, where he attended the NAFTA Advisory council meeting and an evening town hall hosted by the International Association of Firefighters.
After spending the night in Toronto, the prime minister drove an hour west to Guelph on Friday, where he made an announcement with Housing Minister Ahmed Hussen.
At the same time Trudeau was fielding questions from reporters, the Royal Canadian Air Force crew in Toronto deadheaded the prime minister’s aircraft to Waterloo’s regional airport — a 10-minute, 65-kilometre flight — in order to take him back to Ottawa.
After spending the night in Ottawa, the prime minister again boarded Can Force One — this time to return to Toronto for an hour-long appearance to meet with schoolchildren and to commemorate Nowruz celebrations with the local Persian community.
After arriving in Toronto at 2:17 p.m. Sunday afternoon, the prime minister was back in his plane for the 53-minute flight home by 5 p.m.
Of the 17 flights logged by the prime minister over the past 30 days, 10 were for flights under an hour.
The longest flight — Ottawa to Vancouver on March 1 — clocked in at four hours and 54 minutes.
Unlike other members of government and ministers who largely tend to fly commercially, Canada restricts the prime minister to military aircraft.
All of the Trudeau’s flights over the past 30 days took place aboard one of four Bombardier Challenger 650 business jets, operated by 412 Transport Squadron based out of Ottawa airport.
For international flights, the prime minister uses one of several CC-150 Polaris transport planes — the military version of the venerable Airbus A310 airliner — flown by 437 Transport Squadron out of CFB Trenton.
While the prime minister curtailed his travel during the COVID-19 pandemic, flight records show he logged 127,147 km in the 10 months after resuming travel in June, 2021 — the equivalent to three trips around the world.
Last July, the National Post reported the prime minister spent all but 11 days of the month in the air — including a 5,500-km flight to spend six hours at the Calgary Stampede.
Business jets are frequently criticized for disproportionately high carbon emissions, compared to larger airliners. The empty flight from Toronto to Waterloo came just days before a UN climate report painted the bleakest picture yet on the impacts of global warming.
According to online calculators, the Challenger 650 business jet emits roughly 3,150 kilograms of carbon dioxide per hour of use — with short flights having a larger net impact than longer ones.
A report released last year by European NGO Transport & Environment highlighted the impact of private aircraft on aviation emissions — concluding that roughly half of all aircraft emissions are generated by just 1 per cent of people.
The same report stated that, per passenger, private jets are up to 14 times more polluting than commercial flights.
Citing security concerns, the federal government asked that government flights be added to the FAA’s mandatory block list for flight tracking websites — essentially shielding official flights, including those by the prime minister and governor general, from public view.
The decision to block the flights was reversed three months later.
During the 2019 election campaign, Trudeau was criticized for leasing two aircraft for his cross-country campaign tour — including using a 50-year-old Boeing 737-200 airliner as a cargo transporter, powered by engines that even in the 1960s were considered dirty gas-guzzlers.
PMO spokesperson Alison Murphy told the National Post that travel is a necessary part of the job.
“The prime minister travels the country to meet with Canadians from big cities to small towns to have face-to-face conversations with them, and hear their concerns and ideas,” she said.
“As per long-standing government policy and for security reasons, specific arrangements must be made for the prime minister when he travels, whether on official or personal business.”
Murphy described the government’s action on climate change as “historic,” including a commitment to convert government operations to net-zero carbon emissions by 2050.
Invitations for comment by the National Post to the Green Party and the federal New Democrats went unacknowledged.
As well, environmental groups contacted by the National Post — including the David Suzuki Foundation, Greenpeace, Environmental Defence, Équiterre and the Sierra Club of Canada — either declined comment or didn’t acknowledge the request.
When asked for comment, the Conservative Party of Canada pointed to remarks made March 14 by Leader Pierre Poilievre.
“Justin Trudeau loves to lecture people about driving too much or heating their home. He hits them with a carbon tax to punish them for that, and yet he jets around more than any other prime minister to go on surfing trips and to go to the Caribbean in the middle of the summer,” Poilievre said during a press conference in New Westminster, B.C.
“He is completely out of touch and Canadians are completely out of money.”
• Email: bpassifiume@postmedia.com | Twitter: bryanpassifiume
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