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Dubai to Ahmedabad to Udaipur
(OMDB - VAAH - VAUD)
The lengthy weather and flight
plan fax from Universal in hand, we take a nice Saab station
wagon with an Indian driver from the Hyatt back to the airport.
This driver isn't familiar with where to take us for a private,
not an airline, flight and we arrive at a couple of wrong
places before Pam directs him to the proper spot where we
had arrived three days ago. The weather is gorgeous, again,
and tailwinds are forecast. We send all of our bags through
the scanner and are met by our handler, this time a new fellow
dressed in the flowing white robe and headdress of the Arabs.
Our passports are checked and we are soon driven out to the
airplane.
In addition to the routine preflight
items, I have to replace the right current limiter, the 325
amp isolation electrical fuse located under the cabin floor
just behind the cockpit. We have been having a slight discrepancy
in our fuel flow readings, with the right side showing about
twenty pounds per hour or so more flow than the left, and
yet it is not doing it all the time. Also, the fuel quantity
gauges and the amount of fuel we have been using to refill
each side have been in close agreement, so I was of the opinion
that perhaps the right engine's start fuel purge valve had
stuck in the open position. When we arrived the other day,
before shutting down the engines, I had done a quick purge
valve check by momentarily activating each side's start switch
to see if I observed the expected fuel flow increase as the
purge valve activated. In so doing, I had zapped the current
limiter. Shouldn't have happened, but a not-uncommon event
in King Air 200s by any means. That is why our Fly Away" spare
parts kit has about four of them in it! Although we had discovered
the problem at that time, we were too tired and it was too
hot to address it then. Instead, we budgeted the time to handle
it this morning, and in about 10 minutes we have the new one
installed and are back in business.
Our clearance and departure time
assignment are all as we expect, Pat & Ashley show up right
on time, and we taxi out at 0405Z, 8:05 a.m. local time in
Dubai. We are parked near the departure end of the runway
and have over a two-mile taxi route to get down to the end
of Runway 30L for departure. We follow a big Emirates Airline
Airbus A310 onto the runway with a "Line up and wait" instruction,
and the tower controller provides a solid three of four minute
delay to permit that plane's wake turbulence to dissipate
before we are cleared to takeoff.
We are in radar contact and talking
to the departure controller immediately after takeoff and
he gives us a ninety-degree right turn, followed by another
sixty-degree turn, to head us right toward our first waypoint
that is in the enroute, not the departure, phase of our route.
At 0445 we are handed off to Muscat Control, from the nation
of Oman, this fellow immediately verifies radar contact and
tells us to fly direct all the way to Alpor intersection,
at the far end of his controlled airspace. He asks for our
ETA at that point, and we tell him 0545, an hour away. He
has to hand that information on to the next controlling agency
which is - drum-roll, please! - Pakistan!
We chuckle at the observation
that quite a few of the Arab pilots we hear on the frequency
always affix the word "Inshallah" when they provide their
ETA estimates: The ever-correct "If Allah wills it." Yeah,
we'll be at Alpor at 0545, Inshallah.
Also, we have the eerie experience
of hearing many, many, military call signs - "Reach," "Whistler,"
"Chain," "Freddie," and "Python" - coordinating with Muscat
for when they will be arriving at or departing from the "Tactical
Point." Now, I was not a military pilot and my guess could
certainly be in error, but it occurs to us that this is probably
the point at which they leave any controlling agency and enter
the war area…in this case, Afghanistan. All of the voices
we hear are American except "Freddie," who sounds British.
Pam and I go on a laughing jag
for a few minutes as we act out the crazy make-believe role
of the Afghan Controllers: "No, Python 19, you are not permitted
into my airspace!" "Python 19, I say again, you are not permitted
to make a bombing run on Kandahar." "Python 19, you are not
permitted to descend so low. State your inten…" (End of recording.)
Well, maybe you had to be there to see the humor we saw!
I decide to pre-call Karachi
(Pakistan) Control before entering their airspace, just to
be sure of no surprises, even though we could find no requirement
for this on the chart. I am also a little intimidated by the
fact that Oman ATC had relayed a request from Karachi asking
for our overflight permit number. Thanks to Universal's thorough
service, we have the fax with the number and are able to easily
provide it. I manage to raise Karachi and they tell me, upon
arrival at Alpor intersection, to squawk 7271, a new code,
and to call them again at that time.
Meanwhile, a little Jimmy Buffet
is playing on the CD, the weather is great, and the tailwinds
continue giving about a 20 knot push. We notice that we will
now hit Alpor one whole minute early and when we mention that
on a call to Muscat, they say that if we are even one minute
early that we will have to descend to FL210 instead of remaining
at FL230. So Pam, who's flying left seat, sucks the power
back and we cruise along in slow flight for about three minutes
to get the ETA back where they want it. Picky, picky!
At 0611Z we measure the distances
on the GNS 530 displays and find that we are about 50 miles
offshore from Pakistan and about 300 miles from the border
of Afghanistan. However, once we started talking to Karachi
in their airspace the military calls disappeared totally.
Were they all now on UHF frequencies, not VHF? Or were all
of our operations coming in through Oman and not Pakistan
airspace?
Also of interest, we heard a
Pakistan Airline Fokker, probably a commuter flight, find
from Karachi that his expected routing was not available,
having been closed for some time now due to the recent events.
After receiving the new routing he must fly, the poor Fokker
pilot requested a return back to his origination airport to
put on more fuel! Karachi gave him a gentle chiding about
the fact that his company should have told him about the airway
closure.
We are over the Gulf of Karachi
with the Arabian Sea to our right. The frequency is very quiet
with very little traffic. Out of boredom, I start playing
with the GPS and find that the direct route back to Scottsdale
is a distance of 7,335 nm with a bearing of 358 degrees! In
other words, we are just about exactly on the opposite side
of the globe and the route over the north pole would be the
shortest way back home. Playing around further, I find that
when we park at Udaipur today we will have traveled about
186 degrees around the world. We have flown more than half
way around the world! Now, because of our plans to travel
extensively in Australia, New Zealand, and the South Pacific,
not to mention Thailand, Cambodia, and Indonesia, we haven't
yet flown half of what we propose. Bur it is still very exciting
to realize that, in a straight line, it would now be shorter
to continue east to get home than to turn around and return
home via the way we came.
We finally hit the shoreline
of Asia again near the Indus River delta in Pakistan, and
are soon asked to provide our ETA for Telem intersection,
where we will enter India. Nearing that point, I make a futile
attempt to give a "heads up" call to India's Ahmedabad Control
but I guess we are still too far out to be heard. Finally,
at 0716Z, when we cross Telem and are officially told to contract
Ahmedabad, I still cannot raise them but I hear another plane
talking to them. This flight, Sarah 117 it sounded like to
me, offers to relay for us and does so. He then relays back
to us that Ahmedabad acknowledges our report and asks us to
call at the next intersection closer in.
There are huge dry lake beds
below. They must really be wet during the rainy season, but
now they make me think of the area around Calexico or perhaps
Edwards AFB.
Boy! Do Indians and Pakistanis
talk fast! Or at least it seems so to our Americanized ears!
Whereas we would say Ah-Ma-Dah-Bod, they make it sound like
Amdebad, but really, really, fast. We pick up the ATIS for
Ahmedabad but don't give it too much credence since it appears
to be nearly four hours old! There must have been early morning
fog, because the ATIS is calling for 1,500 meters of visibility,
less than a mile, but we have at least five miles when we
maneuver to land. We receive good, simple, radar vectors from
close to 100 miles out, and make a wide right base turn onto
the ILS for Runway 23. The vector takes us right over four
or five huge nuclear power plant cooling towers. The visibility
and haze/smog is much better than I had been expecting.
There is only one runway at Ahmedabad
(VAAH), over 11,000 feet long with only one turn off into
the parking ramp on the southwest corner. Pam lets the plane
coast down this long strip of asphalt before turning right
and carefully following our taxi instructions to stand #13…even
though we are the only plane on the ramp! Our shutdown comes
at 0815Z for a block time of four hours and ten minutes, with
a fuel burn of 2,400 pounds. India, like Newfoundland in Canada,
is one-half hour off from Zulu time; now we are 5.5 hours
ahead of Greenwich and 12.5 hours ahead of Scottsdale. That
also confirms that we are more than halfway around the earth.
Hence, local time when we shutdown is 1:45 p.m. It's 84 degrees.
Mr. Sukhvinder Singh is Universal's
representative and gives us a warm welcome as we deplane.
He apologizes for the amount of forms to fill out, but he
has done so much of the work before our arrival that it goes
very well. The fuel truck comes quickly and before too long
we are cleared into India, fueled, and ready to depart again.
Sukhvinder has been dispatched from Delhi just for our arrival
and he informs us that he will also be with us in Agra. There
are about ten or so gentlemen milling about during our stop,
maybe from customs, immigration, and a couple with guns, and
I am sure that our stop would not have gone as smoothly had
it not been for the good agent's work.
At 0908 I am taxiing out; less
than an hour on the ground. Our plans were forced to change
slightly when we had been informed a few days ago that overnight
parking of the airplane would not be available at Udaipur.
In light of that, Pam and I had cancelled our tour arrangements
and hotel there and had booked ourselves early into our hotel
in Jaipur, the next stop. We were planning to drop P &A off,
fly to Jaipur, spend two nights, then return for our passengers
and bring them to Jaipur for the last night. Surprise! Mr.
Singh tells us that parking can in fact be arranged! We decide
to wait until we arrive at Udaipur and see the situation ourselves
before committing back to the original plan.
It is a short, straight, shot
of only 120 nm between Ahmedabad and Udaipur (VAUD) and we
fly at 13,000 feet. The land turns from flat to hilly. Before
we know it, we are making a visual left downwind to Runway
26. Another agent from Universal in Delhi, Praveen Sharma,
greets us and confirms that parking can be arranged for a
slight fee paid to the right people. He has also confirmed
the availability of a room at the Lake Palace Hotel, where
we had been planning to stay and where P & A were booked.
Okay. Here we will stay.
After P & A were on their way,
we had to start 2GA back up and taxi her to a far corner of
the ramp and park with the left wing overhanging the grass.
No problem. I guess the crowded ramp comes later: We were
the only plane there when we left the airport. We are in India!
We have run the gauntlet without incident! All of our flights
have gone exceedingly well, just as planned. We are indeed
feeling very blessed to be having this grand adventure.
Our hotel is the Lake Palace,
where some of "Octopussy" was filmed, for you James Bond fans.
We are greeted with leis and a saffron forehead mark at the
door. Pam finds the room to here liking. Next journal - India!
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