Mark left the small town of Sidney B.C. and entered Royal Roads in 1977.  After four years of the best darn training you are going to find anywhere he graduated from RMC in 1981 with a degree in Mechanical Engineering. From there it was off to Moose Jaw for a year of fun and excitement on the prairies with the rest of the pilot class of 81. Having attained his wings he was posted to 424 Squadron in Trenton in 1982 where he spent fours years flying Buffalo’s in the combined role of search and rescue and transport. Mark has mentioned that the SAR role has been one of the most rewarding jobs of his career. His next posting was in 1986 down the Trenton flight line to 436 Squadron on Herc’s in the global transport role.  In the spring of 1989 the Forces saved the expense of another move and sent him all the way across the road in Trenton. He had the chance to revive his Mil Col training in his posting as the EA to the Commander Air Transport Group.  While in Trenton Mark had the good fortune to meet his wife Lyn and in 1988 they welcomed their first daughter Blaire to the fold.  Now it was while sitting behind his EA desk, and after about the 15^th memo of the day that Mark thought to himself, “you know, flying airplanes is a lot more fun”.  Taking into account he was never very good at grammar, a slight career alteration seemed to be the path forward.

In 1990 Mark left the Canadian Forces and moved with his family to Hong Kong where he joined Cathay Pacific Airways as a first officer on the L-1011. Canadians were a fairly new phenomena in Cathay Pacific as most of the aircrew were Brits, Aussies or Kiwis. However, after learning the meaning of “pedantic” and the strange terminologies of the Antipodeans, the Canucks seemed to fit in. In 1992 Lyn and Mark welcomed their second daughter Maren to the family.  Mark spent three years in the right seat of the L-1011 and five years on the 747 before moving to a Captain’s position on the Boeing 777 in 1998.  In 2002 he moved to his present position as Captain on the Boeing 747-400.  Mark’s main destinations from Hong Kong are Paris, Frankfurt, LA, San Francisco and Johannesburg.  As he puts it, ”anywhere that takes 12 hours to get to”.  If any of you out there are aircraft design engineers he would request faster, not further. 

Mark and Lyn live in the community of Discovery Bay in Hong Kong with their daughters.   A visit from ex-cadets is always welcome. Should you find yourself in the area just send an email to: mark@sigson.com.