{"id":1493,"date":"2015-09-21T11:32:18","date_gmt":"2015-09-21T18:32:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.ccmms.ca\/?page_id=1493"},"modified":"2026-01-29T17:34:36","modified_gmt":"2026-01-30T01:34:36","slug":"cedric-mah","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.ccmms.ca\/staging\/9619\/veteran-stories\/air-force\/cedric-mah\/","title":{"rendered":"Cedric Mah"},"content":{"rendered":"

Cedric Mah was born in 1922 in Prince Rupert, British Columbia. He was the younger brother of Albert Mah<\/a>, who\u00a0born two years earlier in 1920.<\/p>\n

At that\u00a0time in British Columbia there was a lot of discrimination faced by Chinese. Opportunities were limited. In order to pursue new opportunities, both brothers found themselves down in sunny\u00a0Los Angeles, learning to fly.<\/p>\n

When war broke out, Cedric and Albert\u00a0were eager to join Canada’s war effort\u00a0but\u00a0initially were turned down by the Royal Canadian Air Force because they were\u00a0Chinese. However, due to their\u00a0significant flying experience, they helped train new pilots\u00a0in the British Commonwealth Air Training Plan until an offer from the China National Aviation Corporation (CNAC) landed in front of them. The brothers\u00a0were offered the job air lift supplies and people from India to China over a notorious mountain range: the Himilayas.<\/p>\n

Cedric and Albert\u00a0were sent to\u00a0India. Their mission was to fly into Japanese occupied China with supplies and people vital to the war.\u00a0 It meant flying twin engine, unpressurized Dakotas over the highest range of mountains in the world which were often patrolled by Japanese Zeroes.<\/p>\n

In one instance, ice was forming on the wings of Cedric\u2019s aircraft as he tried to climb over the Himalayas. To lighten the load of the plane, he jettisoned $800 million in Chinese currency just to clear the peaks. We are not sure if anyone ever discovered these bills — likely they are still there on some mountain slope.<\/p>\n

In total, Cedric made 337\u00a0missions flying for some 6,000 hours in support of the American group called the\u00a0Flying Tigers. He lager was a decorated Second World War\u00a0pilot and in 1997, was awarded\u00a0with the Distinguished Flying Cross.\u00a0Together with brother Albert, they broke the record number of hours flying dangerous routes over the Himalayas during the WWII.<\/p>\n

After the war, Cedric continued to pursue his love of flying. He\u00a0flew as bush pilot in the Arctic and in northern British Columbia.<\/p>\n

Eventually, he\u00a0settled in Edmonton with his family and later in life suffered a stroke.\u00a0 As part of his therapy, Cedric\u00a0purchased a second hand car and refitted the dash with cockpit instruments (complete with compass and altimeter.)<\/p>\n

In his retirement, Cedric\u00a0volunteered at the Aviation Museum in Edmonton.\u00a0 On April 29, 2011, at the age of 88, he sadly passed away, leaving a legacy of flying rarely matched.<\/p>\n

Listen to his interview for the Heroes Remember documentary series<\/a><\/p>\n

Read an article on Cedric’s story that was featured in\u00a0Aeroplane Monthly<\/a><\/p>\n

CBC coverage of Cedric’s passing<\/a><\/p>\n

\"Cedric<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Cedric Mah was born in 1922 in Prince Rupert, British Columbia. He was the younger brother of Albert Mah, who\u00a0born two years earlier in 1920. At that\u00a0time in British Columbia there was a lot of discrimination faced by Chinese. Opportunities were limited. In order to pursue new opportunities, both brothers found themselves down in sunny\u00a0Los […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":958,"parent":378,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"template-nosidebar.php","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-1493","page","type-page","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","post-preview"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ccmms.ca\/staging\/9619\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1493","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ccmms.ca\/staging\/9619\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ccmms.ca\/staging\/9619\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ccmms.ca\/staging\/9619\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ccmms.ca\/staging\/9619\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1493"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.ccmms.ca\/staging\/9619\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1493\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1896,"href":"https:\/\/www.ccmms.ca\/staging\/9619\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1493\/revisions\/1896"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ccmms.ca\/staging\/9619\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/378"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ccmms.ca\/staging\/9619\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/958"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ccmms.ca\/staging\/9619\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1493"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}