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Bali - Port Hedland - Perth,
WRRR - YPPD - YPPH
It dawns hot and humid, again,
at the lovely Four Seasons Jimbaran Bay in Bali. We had packed
the night before except for last minute items and had arranged
for room service to bring breakfast at 6:30 a.m. We wake up
before the alarm goes off and are waiting when the food arrives.
For the last time, we eat in our outdoor living/dining room
in the villa. The weather/flight plan fax hasn't shown up
yet. (It is given to us at the front desk when we are checking
out.) We have been told by Bagus Suyoga, one of our excellent
handlers here, that if we have all four passports with us,
the crew, when we come to the airport early, then processing
can be expedited and Pat & Ashley may not have to go through
the formal process of clearing out of Indonesia at all. Also,
their luggage, if it comes with us, can probably be cleared
before they arrive.
All of this transpires and, sure
enough, their arrival at the airport involves merely staying
in the minivan until it stop at 982GA. Neat!
Pam and I have to preflight,
fuel, get ice onboard, have the toilet serviced, update the
cabin's GPS database, and check the Number 1 inverter, so
we leave the hotel at 7:30 for our scheduled 10:00 takeoff.
Again, thanks to the efficient handlers, the fuelers, caterers,
and lavatory service people are all waiting and we are ready
quickly.
It is always a laugh to see these
lavatory service people arrive in their big truck, ready to
pump out the contents of all of the toilets on a Boeing or
an Airbus. When they see our little brief-case size container
that fits beneath the bowl of our toilet, their first look
is astonishment, then they laugh, then they ask how to work
on it. I always do the removal and reinsertion of the container
myself, so all they really do is remove a screw-on cap about
four inches in diameter, dump the contents into their truck's
holding tank, then partially refill our container with about
a half-gallon of the blue toilet chemical. The most consistent
problem is that they can't believe it holds so little fluid
and they tend to overfill it.
On Pam's leg into Bali five days
ago, the Number 1 inverter - the device that changes our aircraft's
DC electric current into the AC electric current that is required
for many avionics components and for our fuel flow gauges
- failed to operate when she turned it on, so she proceeded
to use the #2 unit. The airplane has two for redundancy, but
only one is used at a time. Out of habit, she usually uses
#1 on her legs and I use #2 on mine. If the #1 unit is truly
found to be inoperative again today, then we will need to
have a replacement unit installed in Australia. Perhaps we
will find one there at an aviation service facility, but we
also may end up needing to have Corporate Jets, our service
facility in Scottsdale, send one to us.
Well, if it's broke, it's broke.
Right? Why would an inverter not operate one day and do so
five days later? Oh, you unbeliever! How little you know of
airplanes! Airplanes are not just a compilation of parts.
Oh no! They have personalities almost as if they were living
entities and sometimes, like bratty children, they do things
just to vex the pilots. Then, the next moment, they are on
their best behavior. Go figure. Well, as I hoped, both inverters
test out great this morning. These are solid state devices
and are usually very reliable. My suspicion is that an electrical
relay was to blame for our one-time problem, and of course
it may fail again and stay failed. But, at least for now,
"The problem cannot be duplicated." That makes us happy. No
shipping charges to Australia, yet.
Pat & Ashley show up at about
8:40 - They were ready to leave the oppressive heat of Bali!
- and we are ready to start, but sometimes, especially when
one is going from country to country, flight plans are somewhat
inflexible and often one cannot depart earlier than scheduled.
But - Hurray! - today the Bali tower gives us permission to
launch out of there right away. I taxi out to Runway 9 in
beautiful clear skies and we are airborne at 8:53 a.m. local
time, over an hour earlier than planned.
There is an airway that goes
straight from Bali to Port Hedland, a distance of 726 nautical
miles, almost all of it over the Indian Ocean. That is what
we had filed for and it is the routing we receive. We turn
right to intercept the airway, climb unrestricted, and are
in radar contact for many miles.
When we fly beyond radar coverage,
we start the standard oceanic position reporting procedures
and utilize the HF radio to verify with Australian Air Traffic
Control that we are coming. The HF - another thing with its
own sometimes perverse personality - cooperates quite well
this morning and we have few difficulties using it for primary
communications.
It is a hot for 27,000 feet.
The standard temperature up at that altitude should be minus
39 degrees Celsius but today it is minus 24, 15 degrees above
standard. This means that our engine power is reduced so the
climb is a little slower than usual and we don't cruise quite
as fast. The wind is more of a crosswind than anything else
and is having little effect on us. Occasionally we see freighters
far below on the ocean' surface, but that's about it. I see
if anyone is listening on "Guard" frequency, 121.5 MHz, and
also on 123.45 MHz, the oceanic air-to-air frequency, but
nobody replies. We are all alone in a big, big, sky. But,
hey, it's great to be here!
Finally we start seeing the northern
coast of Australia and are in contact with Melbourne Center
who clears us to descend out of controlled airspace whenever
we like on descent into Port Hedland. This area of Australia
- like a lot of this country/continent - is sparsely populated
and a perusal of the chart shows that controlled airspace
generally exists only above FL200. Once you are below that
altitude, you are basically on your own. There is no control
tower at Port Hedland even though it is an airport of entry
with Customs and Immigration services.
Pam and I notice that the Port
Hedland instrument approach plates list two frequencies. One
of these is the one we have been using to communicate with
Center. The other, 119.9, has the abbreviation "MBZ." (And
over here, it is pronounced Em-Bee-Zed, not Em-Bee-Zee, like
we Americans say it.) We decide to monitor this frequency
on our second VHF comm. radio and soon we hear a couple of
other aircraft giving "in the blind" position reports, like
you'd do on Unicom in the States, as they arrive or depart
from Port Hedland. We do likewise, and give ourselves a pat
on the back when we land and find that MBZ stands for "Mandatory
Broadcast Zone" and all planes are indeed supposed to give
those blind calls while in the area.
Anchored offshore there are five
or six large ships that I mistake for oil tankers. All of
these are riding high in the water, obviously empty, but a
similar vessel is leaving Port Hedland with its deck neatly
awash, being laden with so much cargo. No, I find, it's not
oil. It's iron ore! Western Australia does lots of mining
and Port Hedland is perhaps the largest port for exporting
iron ore from Australia to Japan and elsewhere. We cross the
shoreline and cross west of the airport for a left downwind
visual approach to Runway 32. It is a single, long runway,
and a single-engine Piper is doing training in the pattern,
or, as they say here, in the circuit.
We pull into the only ramp area
and spy a fellow directing us to a parking slot near the small
terminal building. Shutdown comes at 11:59 a.m. for a block-to-block
time of 3:09. For a change, since we are traveling almost
due south for today, we will cross no time zones.
Hey! They speak English! Oh how
we love it! Well, okay, so it's not English anymore than American
is English, but at least we can understand one another easily.
Australians are warm, outgoing, people and it feels good to
be guests on their soil.
However, as it should be, Australia
is quite concerned about the importation of diseases and other
problems into its isolated continent, so their procedures
for entry are strict and a bit unusual. Before we left Scottsdale
we had to track down a can of the proper, government-authorized,
airplane fumigation treatment and have that onboard to spray
in the cabin as we began our descent for the first landing
in Australia. To our relief, we found the smell not to be
bad at all. We had been informed that you could be in quite
a bit of trouble if you couldn't show the agricultural inspector
your used can of spray and that the cabin better have the
trace smell of the treatment. Also, you should not open the
door of the airplane until told to do so.
Well, bless his helpful heart,
today is the day that Pat, for the first time ever on World
Flight 2001, decides to help out the crew and open the door
when we shutdown. Maybe he is just so stoked about being here
that he can't wait to make contact with the natives! All of
a sudden, Pam and I see the "Cabin Door Open" annunciator
light illuminate. Uh oh, we're screwed.
"Close that door!" comes out
of both of our mouths about simultaneously. Poor Pat! "What
did I do? I'm so sorry!" as he closes the door quickly. The
inspector comes to the cockpit window, shakes his head with
a smile, asks us if we've sprayed, and then tells us to sit
still with the door closed for five more minutes. Pat really
hasn't caused any international incident after all, but he's
such a nice guy he sure frets about it for a while.
Everyone there is most welcoming
and friendly. It is good to be in an English-speaking environment
after so long. The agricultural inspector, doing a good job
but causing us a little bit of heartburn, painstakingly goes
through our cabin supplies. Goodbye freeze-dried chicken soup.
Goodbye beef jerky. Goodbye…golf shoes?! Well, only long enough
for him to take them inside to brush and spray the soles so
that we wouldn't be tracking onto an Australian course some
unwanted spore picked up off of a Balinese course. Also, the
little hand-crafted musical instruments that Ashley and I
had bought from the kids in Angkor were nixed because they
had animal hide on them. See? Australia is quite picky, but
it's for a good cause.
Except for that, the refueling
and passport checking was a non-event. Nathan (I don't recall
his last name) oversaw the operation and was informative about
the area and some of the Australian aviation rules. He's the
chap who told us what MBZ meant, and to be sure we said "Zed,"
so as not to sound like the Yanks we are by saying "Zee."
In only fifty-two minutes from
shutdown we are taxiing out for Perth, Pam now in the left
seat. Brisbane Radio copies our report about departing this
uncontrolled airport and tells us to contact Melbourne Center
before reaching FL200. Melbourne, in turn, gives us our IFR
clearance, the routing as filed, following the direct airway
between Port Hedland and Perth, slightly over 700 nm.
The weather is mostly clear until
some scattered to broken lower clouds appear and block our
view of the landscape. Sorry to say, it isn't much of a loss.
Very similar to our arid Southwest, there isn't a whole lot
to ooh and aah over when viewing the desert terrain from 27,000
feet! But how red the earth is!
Although VHF communication remains
excellent and we never must resort to HF, it is quickly obvious
how big and how remote the interior of Australia is because
we are not in radar contact. Even over land, we are making
non-radar position reports. Nearing Perth, we once again are
"radar identified" and the position reporting ceases.
Unlike Port Hedland, Perth is
a bustling city with much more air traffic and hence when
we descend below 20,000 feet and leave Melbourne's ATC area,
we enter into Perth's controlled airspace and remain under
radar coverage until touchdown. We are assigned a STAR to
follow (Standard Terminal Arrival Procedure) that we access
through the GNS 530s' databases. Easy as pie!
It is a lovely 21 degrees in
Perth, according the automated information, (about 70 degrees
F), with twelve knots of wind from the west and scattered
clouds at 2,500 feet. The STAR takes us to the ILS approach
to Runway 21 and we shutdown on Perth Flight Centre's ramp
at 3:59 p.m. We are here two hours and one minute ahead of
our conservative plan. WF2001 keeps on keeping on.
P & A soon are on their way to
the Hyatt Regency. The minivan that shows up for them is pulling
a trailer for baggage! How did it know?! We find later that
the trailer is fairly standard equipment here for airport
passenger service. Maybe when you fly this far - Everywhere
else is far from Perth! - you tend to pack lots of bags.
Pam and I remain around for a
while, getting the airplane fueled and arranging for some
minor service to be done during the couple of full days that
we are here: Wash job, interior vacuumed, struts and tire
pressure adjusted, and the air conditioning fluid level serviced.
Ian Sinnott is Perth Flight Centre's manager and is most helpful.
Just as we are preparing to board our taxi to the hotel, we
get a call from Pat asking for us to fetch a jacket and sweater
off of the plane for him. The temperature in Perth is much
more to his liking than in Bali…oh yes!
Bali Handlers |
Tom in Bali |
Pam in Bali |
Port Hedland Airport |
Port Hedland to Perth |
Pam with Ian Sennott in Perth |
Perth Runway 21 |
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