Atlantic crossing notebook

Hi guys. In Vagar. 100kt headwinds. Tried 170, 180 and 260. Couldn’t get the range although the lower alt should have worked. Forecast was wrong.

Fuelled up, ready to go again.

Hi guys. Well, a big day! Overall everything went well but the wind was challenging for the first two legs.

The flight to Wick was fine although we were above cloud until the Scottish border. We landed, fuelled and loaded survival equipment pretty quickly. Filed for FL180 to try to stay below the strong winds. This didn’t work and the forecast winds were wrong. As a result we decided to make an early turn into Vagar to get fuel. Making the decision early minimised the impact on overall trip time although clearly it added to it.

Passing the Forth road bridge near Edinburgh.

Approach to Vagar

THe next leg to Reykjavik was exiting as some fuel system icing led to a low fuel pressure CAS message. Now there is a bypass around the fuel filter and we put the pumps on but a low fuel pressure problem over the North Atlantic certainly focusses the mind. The fuel flow never dropped and it turned into a non event but still made for a tense couple of hours until we could check in with maintenance that all was good. Extra Prist was added on the next leg and the problem never recurred.

On the Iceland and we had a CAVOK arrival into Narsarsuaq. With a high, fast visual arrival (6000ft on downwind for a SL airport due to terrain) it was good fun and the scenery was amazing.

The final leg to Goose bay was also uneventful we were initially kept at FL180 which was OK but not very efficient for us. This was due to a Citation arriving opposite direction in the controlled airspace above. He was at FL270 and going to descend at some point but you are talking about procedural separation with no radar. Their separation standards are very wide for all aircraft but even worse for non-turbojets. Even though we saw him pass us visually it was another 20 minutes before we we cleared to FL240.

Final pic on the ramp at Goose Bay. Stopping on snow when idle is high was challenging. Needed to use beta to avoid sliding forward.

Jan. Reversing the prop slightly so generate no forward thrust.

So some stats.

Total distance covered yesterday: 2477.26nm
Total flight time: 12.1 hours
Average GS: 204.7kts

Total trip time (wheels up oxford to down goose bay) 15.6 hours

Average stop time (4 stops): 0.875h.