Flight report: Figari (LFKF) South Corsica

Dear all,

Please allow me to introduce myself: I’m 29 and I live in the South East of France, close to Marseille.
Since 2012, I have a PPL/A VFR licence and fly mainly on a Socata TB10 GT, which belongs to a flying association based in Berre-La-Fare (LFNR).
I discovered your forum a few weeks ago and browsed it extensively, until I decided I should share with you guys some of my flights. Hopefully it will encourage you to come and visit us in the South of France. I’ll also try and practice my aero english, since I will try and pass the FCL1.028 this year.

In late summer 2013, we decided to fly the TB10 to the South end of Corsica to enjoy its sunny beaches one last time before my partner went back to work.

Although Corsica is not that far away from Marseille, flying above the sea requires a bit of preparation:
- Flight plan
- Life jackets on boar
- Close scrutiny of weather conditions at arrival

In addition, a PPR was required by NOTAM to land and park in LFKF. I sent an e-mail the day before departure, to which they replied saying that my PPR was accepted.
As far as the route is concerned, there is not much choice if you want to fly VFR from South of France to Corsica: the crossing starts in St Tropez, and one should report at LERMA / OMARD / MERLU. When the military zones controlled by Toulon are inactive, one may be granted a direct track to LONSU, therefore saving a dozen Nm.

So I filled a FPL from LFNR through the CTR of Provence (where they won’t allow you to fly above 1500ft), to STP, then LONSU, NW Ajaccio and down to the CTR of Figari along the coast, for a total of 235 Nm.
For long trips like this, I tend to fly the TB10 between FL065 and FL085. Depending on OAT, full throttle opening provides a manifold pressure around 23 inHg which, combined with 2400 rpm engine setting, yields a TAS of more or less 115kt for a fuel consumption around 40 l/hr (at peak EGT). As a I would be heading East, the requested altitude was FL075.

For this trip, we were only two people on board (my partner and I), which gave us enough gross weight margin to fill up the tanks (204 liters total) and leave LFNR with 5hr fuel endurance.

We took off at 3 pm and the OAT at SL in LFNR was close to 30°C, which had a significant impact on aircraft performance. The weather forecast along our route was excellent, except for a few showers and thunderstorms around our point of arrival. This is very common in summer above the mountains in Corsica. I decided to leave anyway, and would divert either to Ajaccio or Propriano. If things were to worsen in Corsica, I had enough fuel on board to go back to St-Tropez with a 2-hr margin.

We first flew through Provence CTR at 1500ft, then we were quickly cleared to climb to FL075 and transferred to Nice Approach.

This is the “Presqu’île de Giens” (South of Hyeres):

Shortly followed by the coast (picture of “Cavalaire-Sur-Mer”, sorry I have no pic of St Tropez):

Nothing much to report above the sea; we were cleared directly to LONSU and after 20min without any land in sight, Corsica appeared in the haze:

We then headed south to the Bay of Ajaccio. I had entered all reporting point in the GPS, which was very helpful although not strictly necessary:

The “Iles Sanguinaires” (North West cape of the bay of Ajaccio, where the ADF IS341 lies):

I could copy the ATIS from LFKF, and no signs of thunderstorms or showers whatsoever.
Shortly after we were in sight of Figari, where the weather conditions were excellent:

The VAC warns you: the PAPI does not ensure overflight of the Mt. Caldarello. Alhough I had spotted this point on the chart while preparing the flight, I was quite surprised to see it for real when turning final:

Number 1 after take-off of a twin, then cleared to land RWY 05!
Note that our glide path is high (4 white lights on PAPI) due to Mt. Caldarello.

Once landed, I required permission to taxi to the AVGAS station, which I was granted by ground control. I had to zigzag among very high-end biz jets to get to the TOTAL petrol station:

I stopped the engine after 2hours and 10mins. I refuelled myself thanks to the Total card (Note: in France, most of airfields have either BP or Total self-service stations. With both cards, you’re good to go pretty much anywhere). We had burnt 80liters, which meant we still had 120 liters LFOB.

The paved parking lots were full of upmarket biz jets. Single engines were parked on the grass, which I literally mowed with the propeller.

We parked the TB10, locked it and tied it to the ground thanks to ropes and poles I had taken.

We flew back home two days later. Landing and parking fees were reasonable (around 40eur). The return flight was uneventful, except for a thunderstorm just before we left:

We took off on a wet RWY 23. We faced a bit of headwind and were back home safely 2hrs and 20min later.