Career
He joined the Royal Canadian Air Force (Royal Canadian Air Force) in 1950 and was the first leader of the Royal Canadian Air Force"s Golden Hawks aerobatic team He flew for 32 years as a military jet fighter pilot Villeneuve was inducted into the Canadian Aviation Hall of Fame in 2006. Villeneuve learned to fly as a civilian in a Piper J-3 Cub.
In 1946 he obtained his Canadian Private Pilot Licence, and in 1948, he went on to acquire his Canadian Commercial Pilot Licence.
In 1950, Villeneuve joined the Royal Canadian Air Force in which he had a long and distinguished career as a fighter pilot. Villeneuve was a squadron leader three different times, on the CF-104 and the T-33 and CF-101.
Villeneuve retired as a Lieutenant-Colonel in 1982. He has logged more than 13,000 hours.
Golden Hawks The "Golden Hawks" were a Canadian military aerobatic flying team established in 1959 to celebrate the 35th anniversary or the Royal Canadian Air Force (Royal Canadian Air Force) and the "Golden" 50th anniversary of Canadian flight.
Initially a six-plane team was envisioned as performing for only one year with the Canadair Sabre 5, but the Golden Hawks were so popular after their 1959 show season that the team was re-established for 1960, under the command of LCol Jack Allan with Villeneuve flying as the lead pilot with the team Villeneuve was the first leader of the Royal Canadian Air Force Golden Hawks jet fighter aerobatic demonstration team in 1959, and then again in 1960. South/L Villeneuve was with the Hawks from the beginning in 1959 as leader of the team, moving to flying the lead position when F/L Jim McCombe became the leader.
He then went on to Training Command.
Villeneuve is an advisor on the "Hawk One" F-86 Sabre project at Vintage Wings of Canada in Gatineau, Quebec. In 2012 he was still flying his civilian Globe Swift with the registration C-GLYN, 66 years after he first soloed in 1946.
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