Volcanoes 🌋!
Today we have one of our longest flights over water 503nm. Fill her up time is in order! We check the winds, we look for favaouable winds, the favourable winds are at 5,500 and above, anything below is bad news. Next let's see if the cloud base is ok; it is at our departure and destination, in between, who knows! We are over sea so as long as fog is not present this is not problem.
Life jackets on, life raft secure we set off. The weather changed, it is not perfect at departure! Clouds, mist our routing has been adjusted to fly east to avoid airspace. The departure is probably standard, but hey we do not know what standard is. Hills abound, the city is below, cranes maybe there! ATC want to talk, standby ATC, let me fly, let me see where we are going, let's make sure we do not hit anything (ATC were meant to help us with headings and heights, but did not, we requested a heading to. Stay clear of danger but got nothing back). Through the valley, in sight of the ground at all times we made it to see, ok ATC we can now talk!
ATC want us to remain east of radial 055 NHC for 30 DME. OK but this adds time to our trip. We find winds that help us like sailors did in the old days, we should be good. In any case I will eack out any time saving advantage i can, cut a corner here, cut a corner there. All is good.
We make it out over the china Sea (it may be called something else in Japan, probably is). Weather is ok, we have found favourable winds. Half way we need to descend to stay clear of clouds. This is cool since we are now only 1000ft over the sea and can get a great view of the islands below.
We are in the ring of fire, hey we are passing through the ring of fire 🔥, it is a good thing that I did not have curry last night! The islands are spectacular, green, mounds of volacanic residue. We get to fly past them a low altitude, it is only a shame that we are forced to do so by weather, and low cloud base. The winds are also strong from the east but, importantly not headwinds.
We are sitting fat and pretty flying along, enjoying the view of impressive volcanic islands at 1,00 ft, BAM,! turbulence. suddenly we are hit by strong turbulent winds circulating around and over the islands, we are on the leeward side, the side with greater disturbance and stronger downdrfats. Not pleasant! The R66 does not like turbulence, tail boom strikes, low G issues etc: I do not like turbulence, it give me the willies.
Slow the ship down, but smoothly, the book says slow her down, biut smoothly as possible is important otherwise you may increase the chance of boom strike yourself. So helisas off, manual flying and slow her up. Watch for the down draft and on we go.
Lesson learner we give the other islands a wider birth when leeside.
At our lower altitude the winds are not as fouvable but are good enough. Another issue issue with low altitude is radio reception. We are low and are unable to talk to control. We carry on flying straight ahead, we are in airspace, what airspace, I do not know., but I do know that it is nkt military nor is it restricted, so we have a flight plan filed and I as far as I am concerned we are good to go even if not!
The entry into Kagoshima takes us past Iwo Jima, the setting for the battle of Iwo Jima, and the Clint Eastwood film, flags of our fathers. Iwo Jima is an important place holder in world war history and you can look it up on google, make,sure you do. What amazed me about it was its small size, such an important world war battle was only fought on a tiny island. This island had such a major impact on history just as Ireland had a major impact on world history.
The bay that is Kagoshima is majestic, as we will see the next day. The airport is about 50 miles from the city, it is efficient and the handlers are great. We hanger the helicopter for the coming two nights and look at the nearby aircraft, especially the CJ1 which turned up.
We head of to the hotel which is a mix of a pod hotel and utilitarian business hotel. A bit miserable until I talk with the locals and staff and have good evening. Hotol is a dump, location not ,great but the staff and locals guests real fun.
Pizza scoffed off to bed.
Life jackets on, life raft secure we set off. The weather changed, it is not perfect at departure! Clouds, mist our routing has been adjusted to fly east to avoid airspace. The departure is probably standard, but hey we do not know what standard is. Hills abound, the city is below, cranes maybe there! ATC want to talk, standby ATC, let me fly, let me see where we are going, let's make sure we do not hit anything (ATC were meant to help us with headings and heights, but did not, we requested a heading to. Stay clear of danger but got nothing back). Through the valley, in sight of the ground at all times we made it to see, ok ATC we can now talk!
ATC want us to remain east of radial 055 NHC for 30 DME. OK but this adds time to our trip. We find winds that help us like sailors did in the old days, we should be good. In any case I will eack out any time saving advantage i can, cut a corner here, cut a corner there. All is good.
We make it out over the china Sea (it may be called something else in Japan, probably is). Weather is ok, we have found favourable winds. Half way we need to descend to stay clear of clouds. This is cool since we are now only 1000ft over the sea and can get a great view of the islands below.
We are in the ring of fire, hey we are passing through the ring of fire 🔥, it is a good thing that I did not have curry last night! The islands are spectacular, green, mounds of volacanic residue. We get to fly past them a low altitude, it is only a shame that we are forced to do so by weather, and low cloud base. The winds are also strong from the east but, importantly not headwinds.
We are sitting fat and pretty flying along, enjoying the view of impressive volcanic islands at 1,00 ft, BAM,! turbulence. suddenly we are hit by strong turbulent winds circulating around and over the islands, we are on the leeward side, the side with greater disturbance and stronger downdrfats. Not pleasant! The R66 does not like turbulence, tail boom strikes, low G issues etc: I do not like turbulence, it give me the willies.
Slow the ship down, but smoothly, the book says slow her down, biut smoothly as possible is important otherwise you may increase the chance of boom strike yourself. So helisas off, manual flying and slow her up. Watch for the down draft and on we go.
Lesson learner we give the other islands a wider birth when leeside.
At our lower altitude the winds are not as fouvable but are good enough. Another issue issue with low altitude is radio reception. We are low and are unable to talk to control. We carry on flying straight ahead, we are in airspace, what airspace, I do not know., but I do know that it is nkt military nor is it restricted, so we have a flight plan filed and I as far as I am concerned we are good to go even if not!
The entry into Kagoshima takes us past Iwo Jima, the setting for the battle of Iwo Jima, and the Clint Eastwood film, flags of our fathers. Iwo Jima is an important place holder in world war history and you can look it up on google, make,sure you do. What amazed me about it was its small size, such an important world war battle was only fought on a tiny island. This island had such a major impact on history just as Ireland had a major impact on world history.
The bay that is Kagoshima is majestic, as we will see the next day. The airport is about 50 miles from the city, it is efficient and the handlers are great. We hanger the helicopter for the coming two nights and look at the nearby aircraft, especially the CJ1 which turned up.
We head of to the hotel which is a mix of a pod hotel and utilitarian business hotel. A bit miserable until I talk with the locals and staff and have good evening. Hotol is a dump, location not ,great but the staff and locals guests real fun.
Pizza scoffed off to bed.
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