Posts Tagged ‘LGST’
Posted by Bernhard Daenzer | Filed under Flying, Travelogues
Fueling went pretty smoothly, until the Olympic DH8A serving Sitia arrived ;-) Well we already had the fuel, but felt like paying, so we waited *G*. Apparently this isn’t granted in Greece… A cashier in a department store joked when we bought an item that wasn’t theft protected: “Why didn’t you just take it? *G*” Oh well…
Takeoff in cross-windy Sitia was again quite the challenge, even more so than the landing. The ground handling and weathervaning of the tail being quite a hand / feet full. Glad the RV takes off so quickly and the RWY itself was plenty big as well.
Sitia was also one of these AFIS fields that tried to play ATC. So he held us on ground for about 12minutes before he let us go, applying some kind of procedural IFR separation or whatever. We could have been airborne in the first minute and since it was VFR/AFIS technically there should have been no restriction. Fortunately the 30kt wind was helping keep temperatures down vente toboggan aquatique gonflable with the engine already running.
The flight itself was smooth, got a great clearance from Heraklion to climb to FL85 and we flew back economically and with less headwind over Santorini/Milos heading to Megara. The next downfall literally was another procedural (and probably non-ATC) FIC operator, which apparently couldn’t think 2 minutes ahead… Anyway, she ended up requiring us to descend from FL85 to 2500ft in about 15NM! Very uncomfortable experience with ears popping and a large temperature change. Based on the way she acted previously, i was already expecting a smooth letdown through the Athens TMA.
The approach into Megara was easy, with only about 7kts westerly winds.
Statistics
Planned Distance: 227.7 NM
Actually Flown Distance (TO to LDG): 221.2 NM
Top Ground Speed: 169.4 kts
Average Ground Speed: 136.1 kts
True Flight Time: 01:38
Block Time: 01:55
Posted by Bernhard Daenzer | Filed under Flying, Travelogues
Since all our places of interest in Karpathos were very close to the airport, we were able to get some nice pictures with a wide rigth turn departure.
Handling went great again with the same friendly staff from Swissport Karpathos as on the arrival. Also, things went remarkably smoothly in Greek terms, meaning we could fill all papers and pay all fees in the same office :-)
Also, Karpathos proved our simple yet efficient gust lock designs… They held up to the strongest winds and gusts of at least 40kts during our stay without causing any scratches, damages, falling apart or whatever nasty thing could happen.
It was only a short flight to the local fuel station, Sitia.
The wind situation there however was quite extreme. With 300° at 30kts for RWY 23.
You can see the extreme crab angle in some of the pics. GPS puck to spinner tip is the reference aircraft centerline. And yes, it was a smooth landing and yes, it was even a very well established approach. Wing low decrab in the flare works brilliantly with the RV, much vente parcours obstacle gonflable better than with some other planes i’ve flown.
And yes, I am glad we built the -A version, and no, I wouldn’t want to do it in a taildragger.
The ground handling after the landing was trickier than the landing itself.
Statistics
Planned Distance: 53.3 NM
Actually Flown Distance (TO to LDG): 58.7 NM
Top Ground Speed: 156.9 kts
Average Ground Speed: 119.3 kts
True Flight Time: 00:30
Block Time: 00:42