Members of the Rocky Mountain Rangers, as well as city and Kamloops Airport staff are taking down the memorial to Capt. Jenn Casey and the Snowbirds today.

Capt. Elijah Macaluso says it is a solemn, but exciting undertaking as they are now able to share the tribute from Kamloopsians with the Armed Forces.

“We had a few rainy days since this is originally put up so its hard to see things getting damaged, but we came together with the city and the airport to decide on giving it two weeks, and then finally we though of today as the day where we want to take things while there are at their best possible condition,” he told NL News.

He says crews in Kamloops are working with the Royal Canadian Air Force in Comox to arrange transport of these items to Moose Jaw, the home base of the Snowbirds.

“We’ve divided everything into four groups and we’re going to further divide them once we get back to our armouries in Southern Kamloops,” Macaluso added.

“The first group is set for Capt. Casey’s family. That will go to the Snowbirds, who can move that forward to Nova Scotia. The second group is for Capt. MacDougall, that will go straight to him. The third group is to the Snowbirds, and the fourth group, that’s going to stay here in Kamloops.”

Crews were at the scene around 9 a.m., and Macaluso expected they’ll be taking down the memorial until around 2 p.m. A few residents were at the scene one final time as the memorial was being taken down.

Kamloops Mayor Ken Christian has committed to a permanent memorial at a later date, one with input from the Casey family and the Snowbirds.

Members of the public paying their last respects at the memorial for Capt. Jenn Casey @RadioNLNews pic.twitter.com/SHV3ggN33d

— Curt Appleby (@CApps32) May 29, 2020