 |
|
|
|
|
So I busied myself with pre-planning.
 Newspaper coverage of Cliff Tait's record setting flight. |
There I would, after the usual customs, immigration and cargo documentation, (yes, even light aircraft have to provide a cargo manifest at every port of entry), was cleared away, take the aircraft to Glos Air's facility for a maintenance check. After that, well, the time to put action into my words would have arrived.
Already I had formed a flight plan for the record attempt that would take me from Bournemouth, skirt London, then across the English channel, over France, down the coast of Italy to Greece for refueling, across the Mediterranean, Egypt, Saudi Arabia to the next refueling stop of Bahrain. I intended to allow one hour thirty for each refueling stop.
After Bahrain I would cross Dubai, skirt the coast of Iran, cross Karachi and head for a rest/refueling stop at Calcutta. I planned a total of eleven hours for this stop. It is quite normal for formalities to absorb up to five hours of processing when transiting foreign airports and India was never any exception. Formalities would include all the immigration, health and customs rigmarole plus refueling, paying landing fees, obtaining weather forecasts and notams and flight planning.
This was one good reason to stay in the air as long as possible, thus avoiding as far as possible the ground hassles which could be far more exhausting than the long hours in the air. Consequently, my sleep time at Calcutta was not expected to be more than about five hours.
From Calcutta it would be across the Bay of Bengal overhead Port Blair and a refueling stop at Penang, across Singapore, Indonesia to Darwin, Australia for the second rest/refueling stop of about eight hours. Leaving Darwin I planned to head for Brisbane via Mt. Isa, refuel and head out across the Tasman sea, overheading Lord Howe Island, bound for Auckland.
Sitting back in my Pam Am seat I went over all the en-route flight-planning sheets which I had prepared before leaving home. Except for ETD's, I had already made these out for each leg, including the Atlantic crossing, basing all my ETE's on still air times. It would be a simple matter to amend ETA's as I crossed each waypoint/VOR/NDB. Custom General Declarations were also made out for each stop. In fact I went to great lengths to reduce the expected enroute workload as far as possible so that my attention could be devoted almost entirely to the actual flying.
I carried with me a small medical kit which, among other things contained Lomotil to bind me up in case mother nature called at inopportune moments and Senacot to unbind me plus Panadeine for the inevitable headaches which always afflicted me when under stress in a noisy environment. Under no circumstances would I ever consider taking medication to keep me awake. Also with me was my small tool kit to cope with minor unserviceabilities.
It was Friday USA time, but Saturday at home, when I arrived at Globe Aero's facility and came face to face with my mount for the next week or so. I had never flown a Bonanza before but she looked simple enough and I expected no problems.
Globe Aero had removed all the seating except for the pilot and the co-pilot's controls in order to make room for three additional fuel tanks to be installed. One went in front and two at mid-section. The seats had been piled up at the rear of the aircraft leaving hardly room for an extra tissue paper.
I looked at the narrow space between the front fuel tank and the instrument panel through which I would have to crawl to get to the pilot's seat and said, "WOW!" Now I am not a very big fellow but it seemed to me only a pigmy could squeeze into that confined area.
Nevertheless, it had to be done somehow or other so I clambered up on the wing and threaded myself into the cockpit. Trouble was, my first attempt left me facing backwards so carefully I positioned my legs around the plumbing, turned gently around and breathing a sigh of relief finally plonked myself down in the seat. So far so good.
There were still a few things to attend to before we could get on our way, that is to say the aeroplane and me. One was the installation of my amateur radio gear, which was also going to provide HF communication for the aviation bands. Globe Aero had installed a fairly crude hand operated winch for a trailing antenna. The trailing aerial was simply a length of wire on a spool wound in and out through a hole on the bottom of the fuselage according the length of wire required for the different frequencies in use. The correct length would be determined by measuring the standing waves on a standing wave ratio meter. They should be minimum for optimum signal strength. Usually around half a wave length. E.g. 14 megs or 20 meters would need about 32 feet.
As usual frequency requirements would vary between five megacycles and eighteen megacycles there could be times that over one hundred feet of wire would be trailing behind the aircraft. This often took some contortions, especially when it was necessary to watch the radio transmitter gauge for correct loading so that you did not blow the transmitter up, while at the same time have the head down in the bottom of the cockpit winding the winch with one hand, being careful to stop the wire being dragged off the end of the spool in the slipstream and trying to keep the aircraft on an even keel with the other! Believe me, with practice it can be done!
Anyway the Bonanza's instrument panel looked better equipped than any of the other single engine aircraft I had delivered. It sported two VHF's; two ADF's, two VOR's, a transponder and an autopilot. Boy! I was looking forward to that autopilot because I had never had such a luxury item before. I would not be able to use it while flying overweight because autopilots do not handle overweight conditions but as the load burnt off, it would, I anticipated, provide some relief.
By now Florida's Friday was about cut and there were a couple of tasks to attend to before the weekend. One was to contact the Canadian authorities for permission to cross the Atlantic in a single engine aircraft. In charge of this aspect was Canadian Civil Aviation official, Don McQuinn who had vetted my proficiency and cleared me when I crossed in 1969. Based on that experience Don kindly waived the requirement to personally check out the aircraft and myself and faxed me a letter confirming his endorsement.
That evening Phil Waldman, Globe's managing director, invited me to the evening meal with his family and very nice it was. Thank you!
Saturday morning saw me back at the airport to install my HF transmitter. Phil suggested I buy the latest nav. gizmo. A kind of computer gadget that could obtain bearings from some fairly newly installed ground stations and with triangular computations give comparatively close position reports. It was only of use in the Northern Hemisphere and as I was not about to compromise my confidence in my navigation expertise, I declined.
A flight of about one hour in the local area suggested all was well with aircraft performance and although weather prospects were not the best I planned for a departure on the morrow.
That evening I visited the local supermarket to purchase some provisions. Included were some tins of corned beef, some bottled water and some 2 litre punnets of popcorn plus fruit. The fruit would have to be replaced later and the punnets would serve two purposes, becoming makeshift toilets in emergency.
