Day 32: 1997-06-19
TW Retro-blog: 1997-06-19 (Day#32)
Watson Lake (CA) - RTB
45nm; 0h30; Cowan(962)/Hughes(833)
Not a particularly successful day – it started with Bill rousing everyone an hour early, because he got the departure time wrong, the wx was grim, and the Chipmunks were ‘seduced’ into a departure by what turned-out to be a “Suckers’ Gap”, forcing a retreat just 20nm down-route, when the cloud-base came down to the surface.
On the bright side, Yukon Air Services gave fulsome support to the minor MX which was carried-out whilst having nowhere to go, and the aircrew were able to avail themselves of 1:500,000 VFR Sectional charts for the remainder of the route across Canada (better airfield and general frequency info), having been issued with 1:1,000,000 WACs when leaving the UK
[Personally, I find that, with a little pre-planning (ripping, and securing, a few pages out of the AFD), flying XC in a Chippie is easier with WACs (sadly no longer available) since less in-cockpit origami is necessary. Of course, post-Luddites use iPads, which makes the art of pilotage an easily-avoided and hence dying skill.]
Errata:
1 – yesterday’s posted photo of Dave Gill dealing with 962’s prv was actually effected today;
2 – the ‘Canadian’ shown yesterday was the owner of 18065, though name still unknown.
'Log cabin'-style ATC tower, CYQH
Self-explanatory
A selection of aircraft at CYQH - note that (of course) they are all designed with the little wheel at the 'correct' end, though the amphib Otter is a bit of a rebel.
Day 32: CYQH-CYQH 45 nm, 0.5 hrs, GS 90 kts. Cumulative 8515 nm, 88.49 hrs, Average GS 96 kts.
Last edited by India Four Two; 25th Jun 2017 at 04:29.