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Ah, consider Air Ford One…

Behind closed doors and on paper, the idea of Ontario Premier Doug Ford acquiring a luxury jetliner looked like a good idea… to someone… and for reasons that evade me. But the province’s chief cherry cheesecake enthusiast couldn’t wait to fly the friendly skies in that swank Bombardier Challenger 650.

Alas and alack, when news broke about Dougie’s $28.9 million jetliner… well, let’s just say the fecal matter really hit the fan, big time…

Talk about a supersonic goof!

The purchase of the jet was announced on Friday and Ford was flying high. By Sunday, he was doing a mea culpa, apologizing – well, sort of – for squandering almost $30 million in taxpayer funds.

And now this whiz-bang jet is for sale – in case anyone has $28.9 million burning a hole in their pocket.

Question: who the hell is advising Doug Ford these days?

And what was Doug Ford thinking?

Just consider the cost of living these days. Consider the unemployment rate. Consider all those homeless encampments popping up like mushrooms after a rainstorm. Consider how many Ontarians are now dependent on food banks for the bare necessities of life.

And Doug Ford thought the idea of acquiring a luxury jet was going to fly with his constituents?

Talk about not reading the room!

Or has Doug Ford been body-snatched and replaced with an alien imposter? Because back in 2019 Ford bragged that he would be the first premier NOT to make use of a private plane.

So, what happened? How did Doug Ford go from the common man driving a common van to looking like a candidate for the next episode of Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous?

Guess Ford has forgotten all about his brilliant old election slogan when he was running in municipal politics. Namely, “Respect for taxpayers.”

Or now that he has his third super-majority government, is it a matter of power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely?

How else do you explain that the guy who decried the gravy train suddenly decided he needed a gravy plane?

Talk about turbulence! The negative blowback was gale force.

And if Ford and his minions thought the criticism would die out after the 24-hour news cycle expired, they were dead wrong. Ontarians of every political stripe were furious. Opposition MPPs smelt blood in the water The mainstream media went into feeding frenzy mode. And we launched a petition, namely, www.StopTheGravyPlane.com – which now holds the record for our shortest campaign ever.

Indeed, as the pressure continued to mount over the weekend, Doug touched down for an emergency landing. Here’s what he stated on Sunday:

“Despite the best of intentions, I have heard and agree that now is not the right time for the expense of a government plane.”

You don’t say?

By the way, as always when it comes to the weasel words emanating from the lips of politicians, the devil is in the details. Which is to say notice the word “now”, as in “now is not the right time.” OK, so if April 2026 is not the right time, how about New Year’s Day 2027? Or Christmas 2028? Most would argue that never is the right time for such an outrageous vanity project. But never mind.

Alas, the fact that the premier did an about-face yet again should come as a surprise to absolutely no one. Hey folks, they don’t call Doug “Triple-F” for nothing. No, that’s not a reference to his cup size. Rather, that’s an initialism for his nickname: “Flip Flop Ford”.

There are simply way too many flip-flops to list here. So, let’s just flag Doug’s biggest flip-flop of all – going from a commonsense Conservative to a wannabe Liberal who never fails to lick Carney’s boots.

By the way, over the weekend, an Oshawa-based veteran pilot, Darren Welgan, reached out to us. And what he had to say was shocking. Namely, if this Challenger jet was meant for inter-Ontario travel, it was a completely inappropriate vessel.

Here is what Darren had to say to me verbatim:

“The Challenger jet is a corporate jet designed to fly trans continental or trans oceanic flights. It cruises at a speed of about Mach .75 or 75% of the speed of sound at an altitude of 41,000 feet. That’s important because at 41,000 feet where it’s designed to fly the Challenger burns about 330 gallons of jet fuel per hour.

“Down low, let’s say at 10,000 feet (where you would fly for very short flights), a jet like this would see its fuel burn increase by some 30 to 40%. That’s an additional whopping 132 more gallons of fuel per hour.

“You wouldn’t use this jet to fly from Toronto to Windsor let’s say. Or even Toronto to Sault Ste Marie. By the time it got to cruise altitude it would be well past its destination. This is why airlines like Jazz and Porter use turbo props like the Beech 1900 or the Dash 8 for interprovincial flights. They are designed to fly at lower altitudes where they burn much less fuel on short haul flights between cities inside a province. There is simply no use-case for a jet like this for short haul inter-provincial travel. It doesn’t make sense by a massive margin. The aircraft isn’t designed for it.

“It also doesn’t make sense for travel in northern Ontario either because it can’t be landed on the short and sometimes gravel strips in the far northern communities. It needs a fair amount of runway to take off and land. For these reasons Ornge, for example, uses the Pilatus PC 12 turbo prop for interprovincial medivac flights and not jets.

“Since the premier’s role is inside the province and traditionally he or she doesn’t deal with foreign relations or international trade discussions which we all know is the jurisdiction of the federal government, this jet doesn’t make sense from this standpoint either. Even if Ford did travel outside of Canada a few times a year for trade talks or twice a year to another province for a premiers meeting, flying commercially would be maybe 1,000 times cheaper.

“Also take into account the operating cost which are around the 7,000 dollars an hour mark when you factor in fuel, crew. Maintenance, landing and parking fees and catering and storage.

“It doesn’t add up.”

Indeed, it doesn’t add up. Unless Doug was going to use this plane to fly off to Florida or Europe. And if so, was the idea to bring along friends and family members on such junkets? Or maybe deep-pocketed donors to the PC Party of Ontario?

That’s why we launched www.StopTheGravyPlane.com last Friday. In addition to the petition, we were going to file freedom of information requests regarding the jet. And we were going to track exactly where this plane was flying.

It’s a moot point, now, of course, given that Ford is doing the right thing albeit for the wrong reason – namely, selling off this jet in order to stem the flow of toxic publicity.

Oh, one last thing. And we’re sure this is a cosmic coincidence. But just last month, Ford said his government planned to give Toronto's Billy Bishop airport a special designation. This would allow the province to bypass municipal and provincial laws pertaining to the airport. Now, why would that be? Well, this special designation would allow the airport to greenlight runway expansion to accommodate – wait for it – jets! Currently only propeller planes make use of Billy Bishop Airport.

And it should be noted that the City of Toronto has always opposed jets taking off and landing at Billy Bishop. But the thing is, just mere weeks after making this announcement, we discover that Ford himself is joining the jet-set! And it makes sense to fly out of Billy Bishop Airport given that it is much closer to Queen’s Park than Toronto Pearson International Airport, a.k.a., the world’s worst airport. Again, this idea of making Billy Bishop jet-friendly in the near-future was a surely a coincidence...

But really, how profoundly sad. It’s another example of what happens when it comes to the best-laid plans of mice and cherry cheesecake enthusiasts.

And so it is that Premier Ford will NOT be flying the friendly skies ensconced within that swank Bombardier Challenger 650. So it is that he will not have access to the jet’s well-stocked bar, one that surely would’ve been flush with fine California wines and Kentucky bourbon. And so it is that Doug Ford will yet again be denied membership to the Mile High Club.

But at the end of the day, Doug Ford has learned the hard way that old chestnut when it comes to the aviation business. Namely, what goes up… must come down.

Oh, and that turbulence you hear in the distance? That’s not a jet encountering windshear. Rather, it’s the late, great Rob Ford rolling in his grave seeing what’s become of his buffoonish brother…