Flying a plane is a difficult task, and it is made even more difficult when that plane is being attacked by fellow planes or the hostile weather. The unpredictable weather of BC may have served as a good training area for pilots, but it also unfortunately cost some trainees their lives. As they were flying sometimes over the mountains or sea, a crash could prove fatal to the entire flight crew of 11 men. Over 60 men lost their lives in crashes and similar training accidents, and it would be unethical not to mention their deaths here. One does not often think of the danger of training during war, the more obvious dangers draw much more attention; but these people had just as many loved ones as other soldiers who died closer to the frontlines.

Despite these tragedies the overwhelming feeling conveyed in the sources for this website describe their time in Abbotsford as a positive one. This may be due to the culture at the time, death, still a scary concept, was at least more familiar in a time of war, and possibly more important than that, the culture of the 1940s discouraged men, and especially soldiers from showing strong emotions. This meant that many covered for their feelings with humor, as can be seen in the many, many comics about crashes in the Breeze newspaper. This was a very real danger to these men, and so they joked about it, it makes the danger more acceptable.