On Thursday, August 1st, Coulson Aviation made history with the first flight of a Martin Mars in over 8 years!
The Martin JRM Mars is a massive flying boat that was developed during World War 2 originally as a patrol aircraft and later a cargo transport for the U.S. Navy.
With a 200 foot wingspan – almost as wide as a 747-400’s – seven of these very recognizable flying boats were built.
Following the end of their service with the Navy in the 1950s, the remaining four were purchased by a group of forestry companies in British Columbia. Those companies formed “Forest Industries Flying Tankers” and converted the planes into water bombers.
As a result, the Mars became the largest piston powered water bomber in the world, and could scoop up 7,200 gallons of water at a time.
In 2007, the last two airframes, “Philippine Mars” and “Hawaii Mars” were acquired by the Coulson Group, and the latter continued to fight fires throughout B.C. until 2015.
Those two airframes have since been parked at Coulson’s base on Sproat Lake, Vancouver Island, with Hawaii Mars last flying in 2016.
In March 2024 however, it was announced that Hawaii Mars would be donated to the British Columbia Aviation Museum at Victoria Airport, and would make its final flight later this year.
Before that flight actually takes place though, there were expected to be a few high speed taxi runs, which you could actually book rides on, provided you had the funds. There were even plans for a few test flights later on.
Although details on the flights were sparse, well, a couple of us made the trip out to Sproat Lake and rented a boat to at least see the Mars moving under its own power… and boy did we get a lot more than we expected!
A huge thank you to Mike and Brenden for driving the boat, and I hope you enjoy this footage of the Martin Mars!
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FLIGHT INFORMATION
Airline: Coulson Aviation
Aircraft: Martin JRM-3 Mars
Livery: Coulson Flying Tankers
Engines: 4x Wright R-3350-24WA
Registration: C-FLYL
Route: Sproat Lake – Sproat Lake
Date filmed: August 2024
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Outro song – “Take Flight” by Nyhtian: https://youtu.be/bCTTwQ_269c
© Alex Praglowski Aviation 2024
This video is the property of Alex Praglowski Aviation and may not be used for any purpose without prior permission. Contact me at the email in the “About” section of my channel for usage.
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Hey Alex. Just wondering if you were going to the Abbotsford airshow this year?
I flew over Port Alberni and saw it last Wednesday
I saw this aircraft in 2018 and I was very happy to see him fly! It is something very unique even for europeans that have canadair near by for wildfire aerial vehicule. Beautiful video.
While this is a great aviation achievement, I can't help but remember when Coulson promised the Philippine Mars to the US Naval Museum in exchange for an EC-130Q which started their US air tanker program. It has yet to be delivered and now Coulson has used that one aircraft to build a fleet on US taxpayer's dimes and win contracts saying they are a US company, even though all our money goes to Canada.
whats its fuel consumption in full throttle?
This was a different aviation video! Great work Alex!
the shot at 3:47 is insane. the scale of this plane is crazy, I'm so jealous you got to see it fly
Well…had to shut down and feather #4 ! Wonder what happened!
Number 4 feathered, looks like engine work needed. Sadly it won't be though, com-on BC Gov give this bird back her wings.
So why isnt the govt buying these and putting them back to work on wildfires that they could fight and resupply easily? Another trumdumb tragedy to add to his list of failures
why was the number 4 prop turned off?
If she had full fuel and even partial payload, she’d be 10x easier to taxi around. Those wingtip floats were designed to touch almost neutral at a normal-mtow taxi and takeoff. Farting around with no fuel and zero payload makes things REALLY difficult with flying boats. Conventional aircraft love it lol.
I question the heavy starboard list !!
The Mars won't "scoop up 7200 gallons of water at a time". Not with any meaningful fuel load on board anyway. Average loads were in the 5400 USG range, with less at the beginning of a fire mission, and increasing to around 6000 USG as the fuel burned off.
Why was #4 shut down/feathered?
That thing is massive how did it even get off the ground I should say out of the lake
wow, she is magnificent
Great video. What happened to engine #4?
Nothing compares in fighting fires.
what a beautiful airplane ❤ It reminds of those good old vintage Posters from yeah the 50/60 's ❤️
Great video!
Nice. "Made history" is vastly over the top, though.
And ever since our provinces stopped hiring these planes out forests have been burning down at an increased rate.
Wow thank you for these impressive views.
Absolutely stunning footage! Well done.
Many years ago my wife and I stopped at Sproat Lake for lunch. There was a Mars across the water, practicing for the upcoming fire season. They picked up a load of water and flew off with it.
And then, a few minutes later, they came in very low right over our heads and dropped it a few yards off the shore. They must have seen us down there and decided to give us a private show!
Great photography, but on approach to landing, number four engine was feathered. Precautionary? On landing three fans works just fine, but those Wright 3350's were problamatic engines in their early days, as well as the later turbo compound versions.
Curtis electric propellers very hard to find parts.
Amazing!
Something wrong engine numer 4?
It was shutdown inflight (You see it at landing).
Thanks Alex for another video! Such an incredible sight to see the Martin Mars Flying!
So good
Why was #4 engine feathered when the plane was returning?
Looks like it's doing it's trip to Victoria Aug 11th at (landing at 6pm). Looking forward to it!
Superb photography of this beautiful flying sculpture, so well done Alex👏
It's good that she's off to a museum. I'll be waiting for my fly-by here in the Comox Valley. Nostalgia and preservation of history are the right reasons to keep the old bird. Public outcry bought her a little more time almost a decade ago, but Hawaii Mars is just too expensive to maintain for what she's capable of, and the selection of lakes she can land on is limited to well… The big ones. This means longer distances and times between runs. She can only transport water without retardant, and she does it with less precision than the newer options.
I'll forever remember the massive red airplane flying overhead when I was a Port Alberni kid in the 80s.
why was one engine not working?
Truly sad they are lost to display instead of continuing to provide such a desperately needed service. I'm sure she's expensive to operate these days and the logistics with the large amount of avgas needed, honestly surprised they never got a turbine swap like the DC-3
So im flying Air Canada A310 seat 19F the one you took a few years ago and a friend of mine had that seat but the elderly women to the left of him but a bunch of her stuff on the floor their pretty much blocking his leg room to spread out hes also 6'7 and flight attendant pretty much took the womens side asking him if he could get by with half the leg room that he paid over $100 extra for. I have that seat in 2 months from now. The question is does the person to the left get to put their stuff their too even if I pay more for the leg room? Thank you.
Sad to see another legend go.
Such a great catch, Alex. Fantastic video as always.
I hope you go to watch/video the final flight Sunday the 11th.
When I was working in Gastown years ago our windows faced the harbour, and during some sort of firefighters conference they did a demonstration flight in Burrard Inlet, was really cool to see this beast in action!
This is incredible!! It's almost inexplicable that an aircraft that old and with that shape can fly, but sure enough, we're seeing it here! An amazing video and something well worth capturing!
so COOOOOL!
Damn it's big! B747 looks like Cesna near it.
I was out on the lake yesterday, just watching some taxiing runs, and damn if it’s not a majestic sight to see. One of the Martin’s was fighting fires in my hometown as a kid, and being able to see it in person again was awesome, before she retires.
What an awesome aircraft. mankind can really do some things!
Though they lost No #4 engine, or shut it down must've had a problem. See the left rudder trim for compensating for the loss that engine.
Holly audio…