Bristows Atyrau
Memories flooding back......... spent a couple of months in 2002 freelancing for Bristows driving the 'temporary' S76 G-BJFL in Atyrau. Great bunch of guys and girls to work with. Arrived in the February, daily temperatures of -20C and a frozen northern Caspian, one could have walked to the rigs over the ice! Two months later when Spring had sprung, +15C was the norm and all the white stuff long gone.
As well as offshore support occasionally the odd ad hoc charter would come our way, such as the seal surveys we would do down to the south of the Kashagan Field. Remember flying over what used to be an old Soviet era gunnery range, littered with numerous carcasses of expired Russian ships. They sat lying on their sides, targeted by their air force for practice in years gone by, now just left as rusting hulks. Rather a sad sight in a strange way.
In the picture taken from the atlas above, the Aral Sea east of the Caspian is virtually no longer, having been drained by man for agricultural purposes. Very bizarre to sea old ships beached in what appears a desert with no water in sight.
Best story of my short stay in Atyrau came from one of the Russian co-pilots I flew with. In a previous life he had flown Mil 8s in the area, and one day had a large buzzardy type bird come through the windscreen during the cruise. Being made of solid stuff the impact didn't kill the bird, merely winged it on its journey between both pilots and into the rear of the cabin. Somewhat shocked and annoyed at its surprise arrival into the Mil, it then preceded to attack the passengers. The crew got the aircraft onto the ground, and the bird lived out its days hopping around the hangar being fed by the engineers........... You couldn't make it up!
Last edited by Plank Cap; 3rd Nov 2013 at 18:26.