Tory campaign jet takes 1st flight

The Conservative Party unveiled its official campaign plane today, the first party to take to the air aboard a charter jet emblazoned in party colours.

The Air Canada Airbus 319 made its inaugural Conservative charter flightTuesdayfrom Toronto to Sault Ste. Marie, Ont.

The fact that the plane is now in the Tory tour rotation likely at considerable cost is an indication from the Conservative perspective the campaign has begun in earnest.

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It's not the first charter plane the Conservative Party has used in this campaign. AFlair Air 737 was used during the early part of the campaign, party officials say, because Air Canada was unable to provide an aircraft at the height of the summer tourism season.

But the Airbusis the plane that will be the flyingworkhorse for the Tory campaign for the duration. In Toronto today, travellers were welcomed on board by smiling flight attendants and plates of food, and also by a letter written by Derek Vanstone, once Stephen Harper's deputy chief of staff, now a vice-presidentat Air Canada.

As Harper and his wife,Laureen Harper, stepped off their campaign busto board the plane, the aircraft crewwere waiting, alongside an Air Canada photographer.

"Oh, it's you!" LaureenHarper exclaimed to one of the flight attendants, before rushing to hug the man, a familiar face from the last campaign.

Name thatplane

Tour reporters have a tradition of coming up with a nickname for the party planes, frequently incorporating one of the themes used by a leader in his campaign remarks, but also sometimes relying on unfortunate events, or jokes.

In 2008, the Liberal campaign plane acquired the name ProfessAir, after the style of leader Stphane Dion. Harper's was named Sweater Vest Jet.

Others have includedHipster Air, in recognition of the then NDP leader Jack Layton's limp following surgery to mend a broken hip bone in 2011.At the time, no one knew Layton would suffer a relapse of the cancer that caused the frailty, and would eventually take his life.It seems, in retrospect, horribly inappropriate.

On the same 2011 campaign, then Liberal leaderMichael Ignatieff's plane was dubbed UnnecessAir. The Conservatives were saddled with ScaremongAir.

Reporters on the Conservative plane have yet to name the new Tory machine. But, as the sole campaign plane in the airso far, it risks being dubbed LoneAir.

It's worth noting thatthe current odds are better than even that the NDP plane this year will end up being dubbed MulcAir. Butthat, as tradition dictates, will be up the reporters on that plane.

There is a question as to whether the Liberals have already earned an aircraft nickname.The turbopropthat was used to usher around leader Justin Trudeau and a small coterie of reporters earlierin the campaignwas named Hair Air, courtesy of the reporters.The challenge to that is that, traditionally, only the planes that stay throughout the campaign earn an official designation.

That plane was a Beech 1900 that flew a small crew of advisers, security people and reporters from the Toronto Island airport to Montreal on Aug. 27.