A Slow Flight to India

A Slow Flight to India – Day 1 – Kortrijk-Budapest

Oh I was so excited ! This day was my first real ferry gig in a crew of 6 pilots flying three brand new Piper Archers all the way to exotic India… as slow as we could go.
These airframes lately have been certified with a diesel engine which gives them a range of a whopping 11 hours … if and only if you fly slowly. Slowly is real slow : at around the Vy speed of 80 knots indicated !

The ferry was split up in section of 6 to 8 hours nett flying in order to minimize the number of stops. Stops add to cost and consume extra-ordinary time because of airport bureaucracy, particularly in the south.

The airplanes had been ferried already from Florida to Belgium with about 50 hours on their counter. Today the planning took us from my home airfield Kortrijk (EBKT) to Budapest in Hungary (LHTL) over Belgium, south Germany and eastern Austria. Flight was planned to last 7 hours and we totalled about 8 hours engine time.

I was crewed with Raymond Duquesnay, a nice more senior flight instructor from Belize, now living in Indonesia with his family. We would end up sharing about 2 m2 of space together for 50 hours over 5 days … and it was pleasant all the way.

The drill was to drink a lot the evening before every flight, stop drinking fluids 8 hours before takeoff and then only take small sips of water that you sweat out… like this there was no need for toilet visits during these long flights.

We had a team briefing and took off with nice weather from runway 24 in Kortrijk. This would be a formation flight with a dedicated callsign “Waffles”, which made the controllers chuckle. No formation take-off allowed in Kortrijk but we soon settled in a loose formation, throttled back at 50% engine power yielding about 80 knots IAS.
We tried to fly as direct as possible letting controllers and the leader Mack of the formation dealing with proper clearances. For me it was a bit weird not having to prepare and execute all things, but having to operate in a crew, in a team.

And so the fields and citied of Belgium, Germany, Austria and Hungary passed under our wings. We got a little excitement when passing under Frankfurt’s airspace when large jets were vectored 800ft above us : only the formation leader had its transponder on so the big boys could not see us on TCAS but we spotted the easily by the naked eye.

We also got vectored around Vienna over the factory of Diamond Aircraft, reminding me about how Micke Lang on YouTube gave me inspiration to do these type of trips.

The Waffle Formation slowly cut its way through the European skies, chatting and joking with one-another over our common frequency while keeping an eye out for not flying too close to one another and nor loosing sight of the others… only one transponder squawking also means that your separation should be done visually.

We finally entered Hungarian airspace and after about 8 hours non-stop hand-flying we landed safely with some minutes separation in Tökol airport (LHTL) in Budapest, an old Sovjet type military airport now used for General Aviation. We refuelled with fresh Jet A1, and took taxis to a cute hotel.

At the Buda side of Budapest we enjoyed a lovely local dinner with the crew : goulash or what had you thought of !? We were tired but satisfied : this trip could actually work out !

Tomorrow we do two long flights all the way to Hurghada at the Red Sea in Egypt with a fuel stop on Heraklion, Greece.

Stay tuned !

A Slow Flight to India – Day 2 – Budapest-Heraklion-Hurghada

Part 1 : Budapest-Heraklion

Today would be the longest day with two long flights. And it turned out also to be the most exciting day of the trip, particularly in the afternoon (Part 2) !

First flight was planned from Budapest (LHTL) to Heraklion on Crete in Greece (LGIR). We got up very early and woke up the birds at the Tökol airport south of Budapest. A quick preflight check, a run-up (FADEC !) and off we were in the early morning air. This time we filed three separate flightplans so we operated as three independent crews : Mack and Sam in N726DX, Jaxon and Sandrine in N721DX, and Ray and me in N726DX.

Foreflight told us that 3500 ft was the ideal altitude to avoid headwinds and that’s what we took. From Hungarian airspace, we flew into Serbia under control of Belgrad.
Around Nis it became more mountainous and we had to climb to 6000ft to avoid the beautifully looming granite below us. All in all this part of Europe is very quiet and seems to be geared mainly to agriculture.

Over the first couple of mountains, we passed into North-Macedonia and the landscape became even more rugged. We almost sung about « Skopje, Skopje » when we spoke with their ATC center.

Next was entering captivating Greece. The landscape became drier and drier and our type of trees got replaced by olive gardens and yellow grass. When getting out of the most rugged terrain, we spotted a large bushfire. Later we heard of waterbomber airplanes active in the area.

We got passed over to Thessaloniki and we crossed into the Mediterranean, spotting the first Greek islands baking into the sun amidst the bluest blue water. Luckily our tailwinds picked up. We crossed right over Skyros island that featured a huge new runway to its north.

From there onwards it was pure pleasure passing from one island to the next under the baking blue sky. We passed Pharos, spoke to Mykonos and go finally transferred to Heraklion Approach where we performed a visual approach to runway 27 amidst the A320s and 737s full of tourists.

A follow-me car guided us to our parking spot somewhere on a quiet spot… man it is hot here !!

More than 9 hours in the logbook, and we still had to get to east Egypt this day …

Stay tuned for more excitement in Part 2 !

A Slow Flight to India – Day 2 – Budapest-Heraklion-Hurghada

Part 2 : Heraklion, Greece – Hurghada, Egypt

It took 30 minutes longer on the ground in Heraklion, Crete, Greece (LGIR) than expected : something with the flight plans to Egypt. In the meanwhile we were slowly but surely cooking on the 39° hot tarmac while we did not want to drink too much as that might lead to having to find toilet solutions in the next leg of the flights … Two nice fuel guys offered us fresh cold water and we nevertheless took it.

In the meanwhile, two Cessna 208 caravans came in : one was a brand new airplane delivered from its factory in Wichita towards Australia (I think). Somehow I thought of seeing Guido Warnecke crawling out of that high cockpit, but it wasn’t him. The other Caravan was being ferried back from Africa to the US but it had nothing but technical problems and got stuck here on Crete for many days already.

All of the sudden, things started moving again and before we knew it, we were in the air again towards Hurghada in Egypt (HEGN) ! Heraklion Approach told us to climb to 9000ft because of military activity south of Crete, and we slowly complied.

All of the sudden, we spotted an aircraft carrier below us in the turquoise water, steaming at full power towards the east ! And one minute later, two F/A18s fighter jets came screaming past us at our altitude ! Is this an interception by the US Navy ?? Our hearts started beating faster, but because we were flying so slowly they could not stay with us and disappeared as fast as they came in the horizon. Below us in the meanwhile, more jets were being scrambled off the deck of that carrier. A quick search on the internet learned me that this probably is the USS Dwight D. Eisenhower (CVN69).

Before we knew it, another two F/A18s came screaming by and turning in front of us. I tried to hail them on the On-Guard frequency of 121.5 MHz but they didn’t hear us or didn’t want to answer us … wow ! I guess our three little Piper didn’t pose too much of a threat to them. But it was kind to offer us a emergency landing spot below us in case we needed it. Some minutes later we spotted several support ships of the carrier group. We tried to make many pics and videos but few actually worked out.

After this excitement, we droned onwards to the southeast. We heard first and talked later to Cairo control as soon as they came in range. And then we spotted the African coast ahead of us with million little lights while the sun was setting in the west. We coasted in over the port of Alexandria and we noticed that we were being lasered by green light flashes from over the ground : pretty annoying and dangerous if you look into them, but when we switched our external lights off, they couldn’t find us anymore and stopped lighting us.

The moon was slowly rising in the east while the night fell over the Nile. We got transferred to Cairo Approach at 9000ft, and then all hell broke loose : the controller gave a continuous stream of instructions to all approaching airplanes for minutes in a row : crazzzy ! We could not get our call in … it probably took 10 minutes before we could each get our call in, and the controller swiftly cleared us on route at 9000ft. On the traffic screen we saw all other airplanes crazily approaching Cairo International Airport below us. In the meanwhile, the moon was started to light up Cairo and the Nile below us: it was a beautiful spectacle.

We continued southeast directly towards Hurghada (HEGN) and the lights below us became less and less. We had to cross a mountain range and got in contact with Hurghada Approach. We all got a visual approach and landed on the gigantic runway 34R at night: wow boy this is a big airport. A follow-me car brought us to our stands: almost 8 hours of flight.

After refuelling and red tape, we crashed in our hotel after this tiring day .

Stay tuned for our flight to Kuwait over the Red Sea and Saudi-Arabia in Day 3 !

A Slow Flight to India – Day 3 –Hurghada-Kuwait

We got in our hotel very late, and without dinner last night. That morning we woke up very early in order to get the reasonably cold air of the morning for our desert trip from Hurghada, Egypt (HEGN) over the Red Sea and Saudi-Arabia to Kuwait City (OKKK). The waking up was painful, but the excitement grew with the minute ! The moment we left the airconditioned hotel, the heat hit us already at full force. I was happy to have been able to make some coffee for myself. That with the snacks on board would keep me going.

After the necessary paperwork issues, we took off from runway 34R at Hurghada and got cleared to the right over the Red Sea. The turquoise diving spots of the Hurghada Resorts immediately came in view and showed us its morning glory: what a beautiful sight !

Hurghada Approach passed us off to Cairo Control and they refused to give us a direct to the first Saudi VOR WEJ at the east side of the Red Sea due to unknown reasons. We started to climb to catch the promised tailwinds and to get cooler air. But as you climb, the air gets thinner and thinner as well !

We coasted into mainland of Saudi-Arabia near the WEJ VOR and continued onwards to Al Ula. The desert landscaped changed from hills to mountains to plains to sand dunes. It was never dull or boring, it constantly changed but it was clearly inhospitable, dry and devoid of meaningful vegetation. Every now and then we saw asphalt road stretching for miles and miles below us.

Before the Al Ula VOR, we were asked to deconflict ourselves without the help of ATC on the TIBA (Traffic Information Broadcast by Aircraft) frequency of 122.8 MHz with an airliner taking off from there: that was new !

And then we droned on from VOR to VOR over the desert. We flew very high, and the heat (ISA +23°C) that further drove up our Density Altitude did not help for the oxygen saturation in our blood. I developed a headache due to the onset of hypoxia, so I descended back down to 8000ft. That and drinking somewhat helped fighting the headache.

We could monitor the tailwinds on the Wind Aloft data of Foreflight which proved to be a good tool. I could download the meteo report from Kuwait through my Garmin InReach and the temperature in Kuwait had reached 47°C ! We flew from HIL to HFR VOR and after many hours, we came in range of Kuwait Control so we knew that our hot day would soon be ended. Luckily the temperature had dropped to 39°C already there.

In Kuwait, we were told to expect the ILS of runway 33R approach, but when getting near to the ILS, Approach kept us high and even vectored us through the final approach course. I questioned ATC because of this and they made us descend parallel and 2 miles to the east of the 33R approach course so an airliner could descend next to us at our left: very unusual ! Finally they vectored us again onto the localiser and we received a very late landing clearance from Kuwait Tower about 2 miles out. Never had such a bizarre approach … I guess it was safe !?

After being 8,5hrs in the air, we landed and had our planes refuelled while it was still 39°C outside. The red tape was acceptable and we soon got into a cab towards our hotel. I got very grumpy for lack of food and because it was already after 10:00pm local, we only found food at a foodcourt in a mall … but the Asian noodles were fantastic and our spirits lifted towards excitement for the next day’s flight to Muscat, Oman over the Persian Golf. Somehow we knew this ferry would work out in time as planned…

Stay tuned !