[I made a previous post about this part of the flight that was mainly photos, so some of this may be redundant, but there also are some additional flying geek details here.]
On December 3, the weather and winds looked great for the long (and recently revised) flight from Easter Island/SCIP to Papeete, Tahiti, French Polynesia/NTAA with a fuel stop on the tiny Tureia/NTGY atoll. It would be a long day right at our flight and duty time limits for a crew of two, but the weather forecast was great for the whole trip and we were well rested after five days on Easter Island.
The Easter Island airport does not normally open until 0900 local on Mondays and we wanted to be wheels-up by 0915 in order to arrive Papeete/Tahiti comfortably before dark. In order to allow time for clearing outbound customs and preflight, we requested that the airport open 30 minutes early. Of course, there was a substantial cost associated with that as they bring all the airport employees in early...ATC, customs, security, fire fighting, etc. But, we want this flight to go smoothly with plenty of room for any unplanned delays.
This was the planned route...
Our handlers picked us up at our accommodations and whisked us through customs and security quickly. We even got to start customs a little earlier than 0830 local and thus were to the plane by 0835.
We had fueled the plane the day before in the afternoon with an OAT (outside air temperature) of 27 C. Given the max range flight ahead, we also had two five gallon cans of fuel filled in order to "top-off" the tanks in the cooler morning temperatures. We only got about five extra gallons in the tanks from the cans, but felt good that we had done everything possible to depart with maximum fuel.
Fueling on the military ramp at Easter Island...
By 0900 local we were ready to start and depart for the planned 8+30 flight to Tureia atoll.
Carolyn captured the departure from Easter Island with some pretty spectacular views of the island (including a nice view of the crater of the Rano Kau volcano) as we completed the almost 180 degree turn after departing on runway 10...
YouTube video: https://youtu.be/58qRb4m5amk
HF communications with Tahiti Oceanic along the route from the border of their FIR (flight information region) started very poorly and we mainly used the sat phone with the direct dial phone number we asked for prior to departing Easter Island. It appears from the Totegegie airport chart that Tahiti Oceanic has a remote HF outlet on Totegegie Island...
We suspect Tahiti Oceanic was using their HF outlet on the main island of Tahiti which is 900 NM north of Totegegie. In any event, the sat phone backup worked.
Note the "SELCAL" notation on the chart above. More about SELCAL later, but the teaser is SELCAL rocks!
For any other aviators planning a flight along this route, here are the phone numbers for reference:
- Easter Island/SCIP ATC control tower: +8816 2348 9658
- Santiago Oceanic FIR: +8816 2348 9497
- Tahiti Oceanic FIR: +8707 7660 3277
I posted previously (here) photos of some of the interesting and uninhabited islands and atoll along our 8+30 flight from Easter Island to Tureia as well as a video of the approach and landing. Here are a couple more photos from Becky arriving Tureia.
Crosswind for runway 36...
Wide downwind for runway 36...
Winds were light and the landing was uneventful. The airport fire truck greeted us along with the folks that would provide us fuel from four 55 gallon barrels.
A quick video tour of the Tureia...
YouTube video: https://youtu.be/gzbdMTj-UWo
The very careful process of checking fuel quality from each barrel...
YouTube: https://youtu.be/wU1FocxpS2A
After the relatively quick and efficient refueling, we contacted Tahiti Oceanic on the ground using HF (it was crystal clear) to get our IFR clearance for the 3+05 planned flight to Papeete/Tahiti. Weather was great for the departure (although hot in the cabin) as we bid the folks that had helped us goodbye. They only spoke French and we only spoke English, but communication was made.
Enroute to Papeete/Tahiti the weather reports (METARs) indicate some passing rain showers, but nothing significant in terms of being able to land.
We got the RNAV approach to runway 22...
One note about RNAV/GPS outside the US. Although this approach had minimums for LNAV/VNAV, none of the LNAV/VNAV approaches we have used so far on this trip outside the US actually had the advisory glideslope (VNAV). Not sure if that is a Garmin or Jeppesen issue, but evidently the advisory glideslope is not coded into the database.
Our descent clearance from FL300 (30,000 FT) came a little late and we had to do a 360 degree turn to lose altitude before finishing the approach, but it all worked out fine. We saw the airport more than 10 NM out on final and made a normal landing on the wet runway.
As sometimes happens at airports without much transient GA (general aviation) traffic, they parked us on a "stand" normally used by the airlines...
After the painless clearing of customs (with our Air Tahiti handler walking us through the whole process), we went to a nearby airport hotel, had a room service dinner, and went to sleep early. Josh and Becky were staying in Papeete/Tahiti, but the next morning Carolyn and I would make the short flight to beautiful Bora Bora/NTTB. The scenery on that short flight was fantastic (see this previous post for photos and a video of landing at the incredible Bora Bora airport).Crosswind for runway 36...
Wide downwind for runway 36...
Winds were light and the landing was uneventful. The airport fire truck greeted us along with the folks that would provide us fuel from four 55 gallon barrels.
A quick video tour of the Tureia...
YouTube video: https://youtu.be/gzbdMTj-UWo
The very careful process of checking fuel quality from each barrel...
YouTube: https://youtu.be/wU1FocxpS2A
After the relatively quick and efficient refueling, we contacted Tahiti Oceanic on the ground using HF (it was crystal clear) to get our IFR clearance for the 3+05 planned flight to Papeete/Tahiti. Weather was great for the departure (although hot in the cabin) as we bid the folks that had helped us goodbye. They only spoke French and we only spoke English, but communication was made.
Enroute to Papeete/Tahiti the weather reports (METARs) indicate some passing rain showers, but nothing significant in terms of being able to land.
We got the RNAV approach to runway 22...
One note about RNAV/GPS outside the US. Although this approach had minimums for LNAV/VNAV, none of the LNAV/VNAV approaches we have used so far on this trip outside the US actually had the advisory glideslope (VNAV). Not sure if that is a Garmin or Jeppesen issue, but evidently the advisory glideslope is not coded into the database.
Our descent clearance from FL300 (30,000 FT) came a little late and we had to do a 360 degree turn to lose altitude before finishing the approach, but it all worked out fine. We saw the airport more than 10 NM out on final and made a normal landing on the wet runway.
As sometimes happens at airports without much transient GA (general aviation) traffic, they parked us on a "stand" normally used by the airlines...
We had a six day break in Bora Bora before heading to Auckland, New Zealand/NZAA via the tiny island of NiUe/NIUE on December 10. I'll pick-up the aviation part of the story from there in the next post.
