Sul – The Journey of a Professional Pilot

It was my first time flying to Croatia, so I was quite excited to see how it would be. I’ve never really known much about Croatia other than war coverage in the 90s, so this was a good opportunity to learn a little!

We took off from UK and I took took the opportunity to fly manually for a while to keep up the proficiency in my handling skills. It’s so easy to be reliant on the autopilot all the times and gradually over time handling skills will degrade, so every now and then I fly a manual departure. Our route took us south towards Birmingham, passing London, over Germany, Austria and the finally to Croatia with a flying time of just over 2.5 hours. The approach was simple – a straight in ILS, so we were already lined up with the runway from the direction that we were coming in. The mountains were to the north with the Adriatic Sea to the south, giving us spectacular views.

Zadar, Croatia – looking out to the Adriatic Sea.

The airport itself had a small terminal building and a small apron to match.  It had just recently rained, as it was damp, but the weather was mild and I could see the mountains in the distance as I did my walk-around.  On departure from Zadar, we were once again treated to spectacular views.

Zadar Airport, Croatia – Mountains in view!

Today’s day of flying gave me some gorgeous views.  We first hopped over to Ireland, which was a flight that took no more than 30 minutes.  Everything happened really quickly and only a few minutes after take off, we were already at cruising altitude, travelling at over 400mph over the Irish Sea inbound to Ireland.  The weather was cold, dull and it was raining, which gave us some indication of what we were to expect later on in the day back in UK!

The next trip was to Spain again, and this time it was a much longer flight of just over 2 hours, which gave me a little bit of time in cruise to catch my thoughts.  England was still in a state of generally good weather, with clear skies, though the temperature had dropped a little over the past few days, being only around 8ºC in the morning.  Our routing took us past Birmingham, west of London and then past the Isle of White. Halfway over France we were once again over cloud, obscuring the view of the ground below.

Isle of White on a clear day.

We soon approached the Pyrenees and today the cloud cover had diminished, affording us a superb view.  As usual, as soon as we had flown over the Pyrenees, the sky was clear and I could see a sharp ridge rise ahead in the distance, which we fly over on our descent towards Barcelona.

Pyrenees

The turnaround in Barcelona took a little longer than expected due to an issue we had to deal with.  After managing to to calm down a passenger that had a fear of flying (which wasn’t the issue that actually caused a delay) and once we had a new flight plan, we were on our way!  On the way back to UK we got fantastic views of the northern coast of Spain, as we headed over the Bay of Biscay towards the Brest Peninsula, France.  On landing back in UK I said goodbye to the many appreciative passengers that disembarked and were quite happy with us getting them back to UK with minimal disruption despite the initial delay.  It always feels great to have your efforts appreciated with some genuine polite expressions of gratitude rather than the quick courtesy ”thanks” one gives as you’re trying to get off as soon as you can!

Northern Spain

The past few days have been quite windy over Europe, resulting in some disruption due to the necessary diversions.  Luckily, I was on my time off away from flying, so I wasn’t affected by any of it.  It looked like a strong low pressure system was moving across causing all this havoc!

My early shift began today, and though I usually find the sleeping pattern on the first day quite difficult to adjust to, I found it relatively easy this time.  I find a cup of green tea before work always sets me up nicely for the rest of the day!  Am I getting used to waking up at 4am for my flights?  Maybe, I don’t know!  I used to worry about trying to get to bed early, and tried all sorts of rituals in order to get myself to sleep early for the next day.  I found that worrying is just counterproductive and I end up not being able to sleep as a result, so now I just don’t think about it and manage to doze away quite easily!

Todays flights took us to France and then Barcelona, Spain.  The weather was mild in both locations, but slightly warmer in Barcelona at 19ºC, though it felt a little bit colder due to the breeze.  We ended up flying a procedural approach to both destinations since there was no radar support at the airport itself (though there was around in the surrounding area).  I find procedural approaches quite easy to plan for in terms of descent since the lateral path is defined, and so the track miles are defined.  With radar vectors it’s a bit of a game in trying to anticipate the controllers next move and heightened situational awareness is necessary.

Decent over UK, enjoying the sun whilst I can!

The weather looks like it’s improving as we’re approaching Summer.. and soon we shall be avoiding thunderstorms and wrestling with thermals! Summer does bring its own challenges as well!

Ireland does look gorgeous on a clear day!

Cork, Ireland – Gorgeous on a clear day!

It’s been a while! I’ve been busy creating iOS apps – the latest additions being AirScape & Recipe Box.  I’m really enjoying iOS development and I suspect that it will keep me busy for quite a while yet (in addition to the flying)!  I had a great break away in March, and now I’m flying again this month.

The first duty I was rostered for was a flight to the Greek island of Rhodes, which is located in the eastern Aegean Sea, close to Turkey.  The route took us across Europe, passing the Alps, which were still rather snowy, owed to the cold weather we have still been experiencing.

The Italian Alps. Still covered with snow.

Rhodes was a mild 18C and quite hazy – the first time I’ve seen it so.  I absolutely love the approach into Rhodes.  We approach the island from the west, passing the island of Kos on the way, and also many of the other Greek islands that are dotted around the sea.  The radar controllers then vector the aircraft parallel to the runway , bringing us over the town, which we have to be careful for since we are not supposed to descend below a certain altitude for noise considerations.  Then we are given a final heading to intercept the ILS for our final approach to the runway.  The view is amazing and the water looks absolutely gorgeous – a beautiful aqua colour that just makes you want to dive in after you’ve landed!  What a treat for the passengers!

Greek Islands

Over the Pyrenees on a clear day.

We witnessed amazing views over the Pyrenees last week on our way to Barcelona.  The day was particularly clear with little haze.  The flight only took us around 2 hours and we were in clear skies and temperatures nearing 30C – a stark change from the weather back in UK!

We flew to Kaunas the next day, and as usual, on this route, we got a direct routing, saving us some fuel and time.  Just towards the end of our landing roll, I saw, what appeared to be a fawn, or baby deer, cross the runway! I had to look again to check that I wasn’t imagining it.  I let the tower know about it and told them that it had now happily trotted off into the woods.  I’ve seen cats, dogs and rabbits crossing the runway, but this is a first!

It was my turn to fly to Alicante, and so I experienced flying a 20 degree offset VOR approach to Runway 28.  We were initially given a direct routing to the initial approach fix, where we had slowed down and began configuring for the approach.  The 20 degree offset meant that we approached the runway from the right-side, or slightly from the north-east rather than directly from the east (facing west) completely aligned with the runway as we usually are.  I’ve done offset approaches before, but the most I have been is 8 degrees in Murcia, which doesn’t look too far away from the extended centre-line.  At the start of the approach, we spotted the runway and it was positioned to the left relative to us rather than straight ahead, and as we got closer, the gap closed.  I decided to configure slightly earlier in order to reduce the workload later on, and so that I could concentrate on flying manually and aligning the aircraft with the runway early on, to ensure and establish a stabilised approach.  It turned out to be much easier than I thought it would have been and it was good fun!  In addition, the views on the approach were amazing, since it took us over the sea facing south-west initially, and then we turned towards a more westerly heading, facing the land.

It’s now 2 years since I completed my Boeing 737 300-900 type rating at OAA, Stockholm, and the time has gone by fast!  I completed and passed my LST (line skills test) on 11 August 2009.  Since then I have gained almost 1500 hours of experience on type and I am aiming to unfreeze my fATPL soon.  At the end of this month, it will have been 3 years since I graduated from flight school – so this month is full of anniversaries!

I had the opportunity of being a safety pilot again this week, for a new cadet.  We flew to Alicante, and it was a rather blustery day, at Liverpool and Alicante!  He landed on both sectors and did quite well.  There wasn’t much that I had to do since the cadet was at a rather good standard already.  By the time I had arrived at the crew room, he was already there and had all the paperwork ready – he was there almost an hour and 15 minutes ahead of the report time!  I politely asked him if he needed any help and then read over, checked and signed the paperwork.  I let the Training Captain brief the cadet, as I quietly listened, in order to give the cadet some space!  The day was quite uneventful, and the cadet did quite well, and I helped out where I could with tasks such as getting the weather, helping with re-fueling supervising and walkarounds.

As much as I enjoy being a safety pilot, as it also gives me an opportunity to watch and learn, I much prefer to fly the aircraft myself!  So I was glad to be back in the right-hand seat the next day, flying to Palma de Mallorca.  We flew over France, which was cloudy in parts, and as soon as we crossed over the Pyrenees, it was completely clear.  It was amazing to see how the mountain range forms a barrier against the clouds.

The Pyrenees, with cloud to the North and completely clear to the South!

Palma’s always an interesting and busy airport and we have to be quite careful because they do sometimes sequence you in tightly behind other aircraft.  Furthermore, we always include a slightly more comprehensive briefing before decent and talk about a possible side-step maneuver that ATC may impose on us without much notice, so that we are prepared in the event. A side-step maneuver is when you approach one runway and then visually maneuver to a parallel runway and land on the parallel runway.  It was 26C and rather humid when we got there.  We had beautiful views of Barcelona and the coastline on the way there and out of Palma.  It’s a rather large city, and I managed to spot Barcelona airport from the window on my side.

A Spanair Airbus A320 taking off from Runway 24R. They were using 24L exclusively for landings and 24R for takeoffs.

Yesterday, I flew to Murcia and we landed there just before sunset.  The routing took us through France and the Pyrenees again and during our descent we passed over Alicante.  En route the weather was smooth and only during climb did we experience some windshear and turbulence.  As we climbed above 30,000ft we gained a tailwind of around 100kts and it then stabilised around 85kts as we passed 35,000ft and then suddenly just after 37,500ft it suddenly dropped to just under 50kts.  This gave the aircraft a sudden input of energy, giving us a higher than usual climb rate.  We made sure to decrease the climb rate to avoid any TCAS alerts or warnings and to smooth the shear.  TCAS is a traffic collision and avoidance system that we have on board the aircraft and it uses the equipment on board to look for other aircraft in the vicinity and alert us if we are too close to them or on a collision course.  It gives us alerts, warnings and guidance on how to maneuver the aircraft in the event of an imminent collision.  High climb rates can sometimes set the system off, since in RVSM airspace, the vertical separation between aircraft may only be 1000ft.  We had initially requested 39,000ft for our cruise altitude, however after considering the drop in the tailwind, we elected to go back down to 37,000ft to take advantage of the higher tailwind, giving us a more economical fuel burn.

Looks like the remnant of a thunderstorm - the anvil.

The weather in Murcia was fantastic, so we chose to fly a visual approach.  Once the airfield was in sight, we took a turn to take us downwind of Runway 05R, partly over the sea and then turned back in towards the runway once we were configured and had slowed down.  It was a lovely day to do a visual, and I really enjoyed it.

I have been kept busy by flying for the past few months, and lately I’ve had the pleasure of flying to the Greek Islands of Kos & Rhodes.  These are the new routes, that were launched this year. I’ve also passed another simulator check, which clears me for another 6 months!  I’ve also been busy with iOS programming and have released another program called WX Brief.  I’ve been releasing updates to WX Charts Europe as well to improve it and add features.  WX Brief gives you access to the latest METARs and TAFs for airports worldwide, also presents them in a friendly format, and gives you access to statistics, such as the variation of temperature over the past 12 hours.

En route to the Greek Island of Kos, one of the many Greek Islands.

The flight to the Greek Island of Kos takes just over 4 hours, but it seems to feel less than the routes that we do to the Canary Islands due to the interesting terrain and countries we fly over.  The route initially takes us past London, towards Amsterdam and into Germany.  We pass the Alps as we fly over Austria, and then into Slovenia, Croatia and Bosnia & Herzegovina.  It is quite a beautiful view en route with the mountains to the south and beautiful lakes and green vegetation to the north.  The routing takes us close to the coast of Croatia, through Macedonia and finally overhead Greece.  We fly over Thessaloniki, over the Aegean Sea and finally begin our decent to Kos.  Kos is a small Island, just south of Izmir, Turkey – quite close to Turkey.

Beautiful sea with a spray of Greek Islands.

There are many islands spread around the Aegean Sea, some small and others larger.  Many coast lines around these islands have beautiful beaches with an inviting turquoise shade in the water.  The view during decent is simply stunning.  I’ve flown to Kos a couple of times now, and the approach is procedural there, without radar.  The controllers can be a little more unpredictable than usual and with the language barrier, it’s important to have a heightened sense of situational awareness and try to communicate as clearly as possible.  Rhodes is slightly easier in the sense that it is a radar vectored, ILS approach – which means that the controller guides you in towards the runway to land.  Rhodes airport is situated just on the edge of the coast line, which makes the views on approach absolutely amazing.  I flew to Rhodes a few days ago, and we were first vectored downwind, which was parallel to the coast, with the view to my right.  We were then eventually given headings to intercept the final approach course and fly towards the runway and land.  On the approach, we flew over the city and as we got closer to the runway, I had a great view of the coast and the beautiful turquoise-shaded sea.

The Dordogne viewed from 38,000ft passing at over 450mph.

Last week my flights took me to the Dordogne départment of France.  Views over France were stunning thanks to the clear skies and temperatures were mild at just above 20ºC.  As we began our descent the picturesque countryside around the Dordogne region grew closer and closer and looked beautiful as it bathed in the morning sunlight.  This was the first sector of the day out of 4 and the last two sectors took me further south to the Languedoc-Roussillon region of France which borders the Pyrenees.  Just as our descent point approached, a view of the Pyrenees materialised in the distance, almost as if it was a mirage…

This week was interesting – I had the opportunity to fly out of base for just a day, from Dublin.  The last time I went away was in December, to Madrid.  My base has regular flights to Dublin on the network, so it was rather convenient getting there, and it was a relaxed 2 sector day with a flight to Bergamo, Italy.  On the way back to Dublin, as we got to the southern coast of England, we got a nice short-cut and from ATC and flew in a north-westerly direction towards Dublin. This gave us a nice view of the western coast of England and it was a beautiful, clear night and gave me a great view of the coastline of Ireland & UK, and the piece of airspace that I make my short flights through between UK and Dublin, so often.

The next two flights took me to Palma de Mallorca.  On the one day the flight started a little later, and so we began our descent just as the sun set, and on the other day the flight was much earlier, so gave us the chance to enjoy the views in daylight.

Just about to descend as the sun sets over the Pyrenees.

I quite enjoy the flight path to Palma, it does give some amazing views as we are inbound.  We initially route over Birmingham, towards London and on passing London to our left, we see the Isle of White to our right.  The flight then takes us over France – Brest, Bordeaux and then over the Pyrenees just after passing Toulouse.  If it’s a clear day I will often point out the interesting details of the view en route to the passengers and it was on both of the flights this week.  Once we are over the Pyrenees and well into our descent, we fly over Barcelona and route further south over the coast and the Mediterranean Sea towards Palma. Eventually we see the high terrain and beautiful cliffs on the northern side of the island come into view. The view that the return flight gives is equally as impressive. We took off from the south-westerly facing runway and the standard departure eventually allows us to turn north, which gives us stunning views of the holiday resorts on the island and once again, the cliffs.