...when the "controller" clears you to taxi into the runway and when you are in the theshold he clears a big Antonov to land in the opposite runway (Goma).

...when you are instructed to report five miles out, then on final, then on short final (despite the fact that you are the only airplane flying at that time) and finally on the ground, although he can see you on the runway (also in Goma).

Dont forget the 'controller' shouting loudly at you mid go around because you had the audacity to take evasive action to avoid the AN12 he cleared onto the runway seconds before you touchdown. "why u go around I tell u land".

And of course theres nothing more rewarding than finding the starving people you risk your life to save have helped themselves to the contents of the first aid kit whilst you were concentrating on avoiding the CB's.

Anyone who has been to goma will never forget the sight of a well overloaded AN12 flying off the end of the runway and staying in ground effect over the town and lake for about a mile before managing to get to flying speed. Its also always exciting watching a clapped out DC-9 with no brakes trying to stop on the downhill runway with a 15 knot tailwind and a wall of lava looming closer.

cant wait to get back there...

African ATC!
 

I was going into Sokoto, Nigeria one afternoon, the only airplane within 100 miles, I think.

I had called within range and passed my estimates. Then I called again ten miles out and again on short final. About then the tower lost power and went onto some crummy little battery-powered radio, so that the controller couldn't really make out much except that some airplane was calling on the tower frequency. Now who might that be?

Sherlock there was shouting down his radio insisting that the mystery aircraft identify itself when all he would have had to do was to look out the big windows to see my Cessna there all lit up on final, right on ETA!

Another time we were waiting in the VIP waiting room there for our passengers, when my Nigerian co-pilot decided to use the toilet. Unfortunately for him, he chose the one that was reserved for the VVIP, the Sultan or Emir or Sardauna or whatever he was called, so that the surly custodian locked the door while he was in there!

Some time later I wondered what had become of him, so that I went looking, when I heard muffled cries of distress emanating from the V.V.I.P. B.O.G. Once we had negotiated his release a heated discussion ensued between the custodian and the co-pilot, who happened to be a minor prince from Yorubaland. That cut no ice with this fellow from Sokoto, of course, when it came to defiling the holy of holies at the airport!

Overheard in NDjamena
 

ATC : (Callsign), cleared XYZ, After departure right turn out squawk 7700

American CHC crew, very drily : Uhhhhh, thats the emergency code sir.

ATC : eeeeeeeeeeeehhhhhhhhhhh, I say again squawk 7700

Yanks : Uhhh, we are negative emergency sir.

ATC : STANDBY

about a min later he clears them to takeoff and refuses to mention anything about squawk codes, the CHC guys just said to him "We will be squawking 2000"

Amazing!!

Disobedience!
 

One day we got something like 37234 as the squawk, when one of those "Do what I tell you to do because dis be my country" discussions ensued for a short while.

Another time we got something like 3782, which led to another, similar discussion.

Of course we have all had to turn to heading 370 or make a right turn to 350 from heading 355 but that could happen anywhere, I guess.

One day I was on my way to Abuja when my buddy the Prince said there was an Airbus at our 3 o'clock and three miles, same heading.

"Ah yes, well. It is often so that another aircraft will appear to be at the same altitude when it is actually two thousand feet higher or lower. Let us see now... DAMN!"

Yes, well, there was a pefectly reasonable explanation. We departed Lagos for Abuja ten minutes ahead of A310 Whiskey Tango Whatever, cleared to F230, ETA ATD plus 1:10. The A310 departed Lagos at our ATD plus ten with an ETA of our ATD plus 1:00, cleared to F230. So we had ten minutes separation at each end. What happened in the middle, well...

The funny thing with that one was that ATC ignored their attempted homicide but tried to hang me the next week for doing a perfectly legal VFR departure from Lagos with an en-route transition to an IFR arrival at Abuja.

The very same A310 captain got all torqued when the little Cessna just blasted off while he was stuck there waiting for an IFR clearance that was never going to be delivered, due to some ATC industrial action. I could go 65 miles at 1 500 feet without burning all my fuel, when he couldn't, I guess. Life is unfair: get over it.

Since he was also some kind of Line Training Captain with some status at the NCAA he went whining like a little bitch to them to see if he couldn't get justice. I found it grimly funny that a gross error went ignored while a non-event had me trekking back and forth to see if I might not say something, anything, incriminating. Nigeria at its best, that was.

Bet you he had his girlfriend in the tower and had her dripping all over the floor with his masterful handling of traffic by the end of his shift (if he waited that long).

Hahaha Sdt... "end Of His Shift" In More Ways Than One.... :}:}:d

A Namibian Air Farce officer had just returned from China, where he had attended the ground-school for some or other chinese turboprop heap that said military had procured. On inspecting the lineup of aged 335 piston 'push-pulls' that represented the cream of the crop of Namibian military might, he discovered that ALL the props were broken! Dutiful to the end, the Major-General-Admiral found a blade-paddle and proceeded to repair the defective props.. by cranking them into the feathered position! I believe he 'fixed' about four 335's before someone managed to stop him. :p

It always used to amaze me that, no matter how hard you
tried to hide them, any empty engine oil or hydraulic oil cans
were snapped up AT ONCE.
The locals had millions of uses for them, from making toys or
jewellery, to using them as cooking pots!
I did think of starting a business exporting them to Africa at
one stage. Could've made a fortune, (NOT).
They never seemed to have the same appeal to the Africans
if you actually GAVE them the empties.
I reckon part of the game was to quietly slip them away from
you without you actually noticing.
I used to upset things sometimes by crushing the cans !
Not a very popular move!;)

As a professional and I mean just that what I find most disgusting and disturbing is that it is the pilots from outside Africa looking to build up hours who tend to end up in Africa and start making stupid jokes about the system when they are the cause of 50% of the ****-ups themselves.

Africa has a long way to go, but what complicates the equation is outsiders who come to build up their hours, officials corrupted by outside money and many other system faults.

Watch this space for an African Miracle coming to a place near you.

fropilot
 

I have never flown in africa as a pilot yet, only as a passenger, but I have lived there for 20 years and I've been running a business there for 2 years. You cannot imagine all the bullsh*** you can encounter when working there and trying to do a clean, legal, professional job. There is no reason Aviation shouldn't be managed the same way countries are managed over there, it must be terrible and chaotic. And I have confirmation from my brother who flew there for 5 years before moving on to an international airline, he told me crazy stories about the african sky you wouldn't believe.

And this is Africa, you can't do anything about it, just live with it and deal with it.

I really don't think that those pilots from outside or inside africa are responsible for the system. I'm sure that if it wasn't for their awareness and professionalism there would be far more accidents in that region of the world.

Also, the posts in this thread are not jokes, they are facts and situations that really took place.

Have you ever been to Africa? You really cannot understand Africa until you have lived there for some time.

"empty engine oil or hydraulic oil cans were snapped up AT ONCE".....
-Had the same in Moz with cig buts, emptied two ashtrays out at the side of the apron, not a sole in sight, walk 10 meters back to the aircraft,came back with another ashtray full of buts and I couldnt find the previous pile- all gone!-taking great care to watch this time notice 2 'scruffs' just crawl out of the woodwork,- amazing!
Re African Atc ,-was once over Zambia when an engine let go with a violent bang, so declared an emergency and plan to divert to the nearest airport which was Lusaka-controller came back with "Arrr eessh we are too busy we cannot accept you, please go to Ndola!"....yea right I just declared an emergency who has priority over me..vip?!

Which came first?
 

It is a fair point to raise, whether the expats contribute to the mess that can be African aviation or whether they are partially responsible. I think you need to spend some time there first before you can understand the situation.

The funniest part of that one is how often we see well-meaning people, all warm and fuzzy, coming to Africa with their liberal ideals. After about three days of being thoroughly worked over by these poor, little, semi-retarded, disadvantaged Africans whom they think they love (why?) there they are in the bar, spitting venom and saying they should drop the Bomb on the place. Yeah, well, turns out the indigenes are fully-formed, often highly intelligent adults who make the perfectly informed decision to take full advantage of these idealistic schnooks.

I used to see them come, the Chosen Ones sent to reform aviation in Africa with their wisdom, superior airmanship and their compassion. I used to hear them losing their rags with ATC. And then I used to see them go.

The record-holder in my last outfit was the 24-hour German. Okay, to be fair it was maybe 27 hours if you count the time between the arrival of LH560 and the departure of LH561. He came in the bar freaked out over having seen a group of black men with guns on the corner of the main road from the airport (police, actually) and decided that Lagos just wasn't for him.

Guys would rock up, lose the plot and disappear over the horizon cursing the entire Nigerian nation and every sick, racist, white bastard who was working there, all in the name of African reality failing to conform to their precious, little liberal preconceptions.

On the other hand, this Swedish lady showed up to be shocked by my crude ways with our local driver when he missed a turn-off I had been pointing out for 500 metres. "It is that one right there so slow down now... We are almost there and you are going to miss it... HERE! Turn HERE, godammit! Oh, FARK! That was it back there, you dozy git! Call yourself a driver! My granny could have made that and you missed it after staring at it for 500 metres! Now we have to go 3 klicks, turn around, drive through that nasty slum area and turn back to show up late for the client's Christmas party. If you miss it on the way back you are sacked!" Blah-blah-blah... the Oyingbo is blowing big, big grammar again, ho-hum... Like when you shout at your dog for eating your slippers, actually.

So Inger was shocked by meeting this crudely-spoken maniac. Fast forward three months and it was Inger who would go to the driver to say, "You stink. Here is soap. Go wash." (He really could skunk out our little Mexican-built Nissan if he went about three or four days without a bath. I guess he ate a lot of spicy stuff. We men used that to keep the car for ourselves but Inger was made of finer stuff.) She was not stupid and she clicked on the idea that this was not Sweden, actually, where a weakling would have retired hurt.

Jumbo744, in Nigeria, an Austrian and his firm,Avstatel or Avatel(not sure of the name), along with 2 ex mimisters, are being charged for stealing money meant to revamp the bad ATC system you guys are mocking.The bad things happening here are partly as a result of the cooperation of expats from Europe and and other developed countries and our leadership.:sad:

Got us there, yes...
 

Whatever next, white crooks co-operating with black crooks!

Most of us posting here, I think, are low-level guys. Not that we are pillars of virtue, just that we do not usually have the chance to pervert the system to line our pockets even if we wanted to.

It is not that we want to zing the poor old Africans, as if to say that they are the only ones to make a mess of things but here it is the African system under discussion.

If you get told, every bl**dy day, to "Squawk Alfa XXXX..." because this dozy git thinks "Alfa" means "Altitude," well, this sort of thing does engender a certain attitude towards African ATC and Africans in general.

What, you mean "Charlie" refers to altitude and "Alfa" refers to the numerical code itself? How does that make any sense? (It beats me but it is so and you could look that up for yourself if you could find a copy of the relevant ICAO publication in this hole of an office you inhabit with crap scattered everywhere.)

How often I would explain, chapter and verse, what ICAO had to say about this or that when I could literally see the information zizzing right through that thick skull like a neutrino or whatever those thingies are that can pass right through the Earth itself without even slowing down.

It was as if to ask, "Will knowing this make me a better, safer pilot?" (Yes, of course it will, you stupid git! We are not alone here in the African skies; there are many people here from other lands where they expect SARPS to apply. Boring stuff such as keeping that transponder on even when out of radar contact, so that the other crew's TCAS has a chance to prevent a mid-air.)

Followed closely by, "Will anything bad happen to me if I ignore this white clown and stick to the local way of doing things half-baked, the way I prefer to do them? (No, of course not; this is, after all "Your country!")

I had to point out this transponder business one afternoon to a crew from a rival company after we had a close one. This time we were in the clear and could see them busting an altitude right in front of us, when there was nothing showing on the TCAS. We asked, politely, ATC to ask them if they were, perhaps, squawking Oscar November there, when they suddenly appeared. Whoah, ju-ju!

So when I went over to tell them about this miracle, life-saving gizmo we had, the answer was, well, why should they turn on their transponder when they did not have TCAS themselves. You know, what diffo would it make to them?

I just stood there gawking at the sheer stupidity of this before gathering my thoughts to point out that it was usually so that both parties to a mid-air collision ended up dead, hmmm? "Oh, yeah, I guess so..." was the response, but I really don't know if they got my point or not.

Never mind SARPS, they had their own, time-honoured, local way of doing things. One more switch to flip, sigh... What is the point, when mid-airs are so rare?

You probably saw I had him arrested for his own safety. His car was in the parking lot.

The miracle is that some of the guys posting here are still prepared to ply their trade in Africa and having given up and left the locals to their lot.....

Finally from the old RSA and homelands: Flying a low level nav exercise in a noddy jet, I pass close to Pilanesberg ATZ and decide to give the tower a courtesy call to check for traffic.

"Ahh, B47D, you are cleared to land runway 27. Do you require transport to the casino?"

Yeah, it's those nasty outsiders, it's all their fault... :E

To add to the list: You know you're in Africa when they're blaming somebody else for everything!

And.....I never realised you could actually discriminate against money! ;) 'Outside' money?

You know you're in Africa when the police helicopter gets shot down

Johannesburg - A police helicopter has crashed, injuring of the three occupants, after being shot at by robbers in Meadowlands, Soweto on Friday morning.

"They were helping the Dog Unit pursue armed robbers at the time and were shot at," said police spokesperson Captain Dennis Adriao.

According to Johannesburg Emergency Services the helicopter hit power lines before crashing.

All three occupants were airlifted to Johannesburg's Milpark Hospital in a very critical condition, spokesperson Percy Morokane said.

The incident happened at around 09.20.

How were they helping the DOG unit pursue robbers ?

I suppose they had a bloodhound on a bit of rope ?
Wouldn't surprise me at all !!

Next time get a longer bit of rope !!!!!:ugh:

Fropilot, what's this "African Miracle coming to
a place near you" that you mentioned in post 94 ?
Don't tell me the Messiah will turn up in Lusaka
or somewhere like that ?:eek:.
Or will it be Luton , and he'll be Blick?;)

...when you ask the "controller" what is the other traffic position (whose ETA is exactly the same as yours) and he answers, with an increasing pitch of his voice: "you are visual, you have to look for traffic!" Oh, Goma, I will always remember you.

...when you go to the pub and all local women smile at you.

mlindb
 

How frightening is that?:}

Not frightening at all, but only happens in Africa (for a price) :ok:

Just my point Mlindb, for a price.:*

And that price was a paltry couple of drinks in The Cotton Club in Libreville...................................













so a mate told me!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!:}

...when your aircraft "burns" exactly 50 lbs of jet-A per side whilst parked on the apron overnight.

When, in a bar with a ciggy in one hand and a Tusker in the other, a hand curls cunningly around your tadger and a voice asks softly from behind, "You like me?"

> ...a hand curls cunningly around your tadger and a voice asks softly from behind, "You like me?"

...and later you discover that this hand not only grabed your control-column, but also your wallet.

It has being over 30 years since I was in Africa and it all sounds way too true.
Like a weird drug I miss the place.
I guess you just have to be (ing) there.
20driver

It is still Africa...
 

Just this morning we rocked up at the appointed time on the ramp at DAUH. No shuttle bus in sight and the temperature already heading past 40° at 8:30 a.m.

We show up every day at the same time, five days a week. Is the bus ever there waiting for us? Say what?

The fuel bowser takes everything in strict rotation, so that if you see an An-12 on the ramp you just know you are screwed! My Twotter takes 15 minutes to top off but they drive right past to spend an hour pumping kerosene into that dinosaur.

It's okay though; I like standing around in the sunshine getting a thrill from the feeling of sweat dripping off my goolies. It is one of those kinky thrills I just never dreamt of when I decided to become a professional pilot.

I just never appreciated the pleasure to be derived from a summer rainstorm in northern Europe. Water falling out of the sky... whatever next?

The other morning a bull camel gave me, "Oy, you! You looking at my cow?" Fark! Turns out I should have screamed, shouted and waved my arms or at least thrown him a breadroll. Instead I just turned and stared at him with a rather dull expression on my face. Hey it worked in Nigeria with large, angry men in uniform. I knew enough not to try some dash, at least.

That reminds me. Ferried a Lear down to Lanseria about 8 years ago. The company didn't object to me taking my then-girlfiend along, Scandinavian blonde. When pit-stopping in Accra, this huuuge local booms out at me, my bird and my colleague as we pass him in the terminal: "I like your woman - give her to me!"
This was delivered with an ear-to-ear grin, and was clearly meant in jest and in complimentary fashion.
Poor lass didn't budge from our side until out of the country :p

Its right about then you rather offer him your cousin, Smith, and his mate Wesson, and pump some lead into his face....while replicating his grin obviously.

Yeah but Chuks..... you do look like a camel:}

Or maybe there's no water at FCP and you just smelt like his brother:E

(you still on FCP bro?):ok:

Great thread
 

This is the funniest thread ever, keep the posts coming guys. Having spent my entire career so far in Africa, I can certainly relate to all these experiences! This was my personal favorite:

We'd just landed our F.28 and were asked to make a 180 at the end of the runway and backtrack to the parking, first holding short of the intersecting runway for landing traffic, a C182. Imagine our surprise on completing our 180 to find the aforementioned Cessna on short final for the very runway we were backtracking! The tower controller screamed at him to go-around, which he did (from about 10 feet), before completing a split-arse turn to line up for the intersecting runway. When asked what the hell he had been playing at, he replied that he could have landed well short of us - no mention of being lined up with a runway 90 degrees off the one he was supposed to be landing on! On parking, the 182 pilot was asked to report to the tower to further explain himself. We watched in total amazement as the pilot stepped down from his plane and strode towards the tower building, sporting (I kid you not) an eyepatch over his right eye! He had been carrying 2 passengers who were connecting to our flight.:ooh::ooh::ooh:

I think I know him. I'm sure he normally wears it over his left eye.

fire engine
 

Great thread reminds me of an incident where officials decided it would be a good idea to perfom a drill in case of an aircraft crash so they lit a fire in the bush a few km from the airport and called in all emergency services to respond. Fire engine and ambulance had a head on enroute to the crash resulting in no fire engine for the next 6 months at the airport. Finally a shiny new red one was donated by some nice donor organisation and was delivered with much pomp and ceremony. Everybody had to have his turn trying out the new fire truck including the " assistant mechie" who managed to drive it head first into a storm drain - another 6 months until they could find another donor to buy a replacment.

And then again atr Lubumbashi with the B200... on several occasions had left the a/c overnight to find a couple of hundred litres of fuel missing the following morning... an army unit is based at the airport sleeping in tents and the suspicion was that they were selling the stuff on...it's not unusual for small amounts to be bled out for oil lamps but 200+ litres is a lot of oil lamps...
Anyway, I got into the habit of fueling in the morning rather than on arrival until we were booked to fly the big chief of Katanga region out early the following day and needed to fuel on arrival...
The morning comes for the departure... military band playing... many dignitories shaking hands with the big chief and then ... yes... we have insufficient fuel in the tanks and the whole thing takes an hour to rectify with the big boss fuming...eventually we fly him out and bring him back..
The following day I arrive to fly back to Kin and there at the tents are about 30 soldiers standing stripped to the waist each waiting to bend down and be lashed by the seargent weilding a long cane.

I think some of the pilots that I knew wore eye-patches on
BOTH eyes! It kept them calm on short finals.:sad:

Hearing the following conversation at lumbumbashi (and many other places....)

Lumbum TWR: xxx, cleared the LUB, descend to FL080.
xxx: umm, tower, confirm LUB is working?
TWR: negetive, negetive, LUB not working.
xxx: roger, so confirm then we are cleared visualy to the airport?
TWR: negetive, negetive, cleared direct LUB FL080!
xxx: (exasperated sigh) roger......