Johan Walden A SLIM LOGBOOK

THE HANGAR RAT VOYAGE

(PART 2)

In case you missed it, Part 1 was the first leg of a 1600nm trip my buddy Sean and I were doing around the country to build experience in the art of going from A to B in a very noisy and fun (and slightly expensive!) way.

SEAN AND I WERE ENTERING the dusty A FOILED ATTEMPT expanse of the Karoo enroute to Beaufort West, The furthest point of our trip was to be Pretoria’s right where we left off in last month’s story. Our Wonderboom Airport– by far the furthest either second attempt to leave Morningstar Airfield of us had flown, and certainly the busiest. 45 minutes earlier was going much better than On the chart, yesterday’s when the weather sent I REALISED WE Johannesburg’s airspace looked like a giant us running for home with our WERE GOING spider’s web containing tails between our legs. The Jabiru 430’s INTO THE a seemingly impenetrable maze of corridors engine was purring and we SPIDER’S WEB and routes beneath the TMA had beautifully where all the big clear skies. boys flew. But after yesterday’s foiled attempt This was our crack at getting out of the to get underway, our ‘Jabbi’ just wasn’t going “cabbage patch”, as my instructor put it, and to make it all the way there before the weather going further than just the usual breakfast run closed in. We’d lost a big slice of the trip, but I destinations on repeat. If hour building for a couldn’t help feeling waves of relief. Today we CPL, one might as well make it interesting and would go as far as Bloemfontein. Then tomorrow actually learn something. we’d fly westwards to Kimberley, Upington, and

The planned route

Springbok, before coming down the West Coast to Morningstar. A few hours after a refuelling stop in Beaufort West, we finally spotted Bloem on the horizon. The bumps and jerks over the past three hours had jiggled our guts, and we were glad to set the wheels down for the last time today. But the day wasn’t quite over as that evening we got a call from our instructor who’d been keeping tabs on the weather for us, and he had some news. The forecast for Pretoria looked much better than it had yesterday, so if we aimed to get there tomorrow morning, refuel, and then fly down to Kimberley well south of the afternoon thunderstorms, we might just pull it off. Two hands twisted my stomach as I realised we were going into the spider’s web after all.

GET OUT OF JAIL FREE

Next morning, trying to put a brave face on it, I preflighted the aircraft and started faffing around with my papers while Sean (who did not look nervous) dialled up the ATIS: Broken cloud at 1500ft… “Zone IMC” – no VFR traffic allowed. The cloud base must’ve been 1499ft because nothing else I could see in the sky hinted at instrument conditions. I phoned the met office and they said it would be another hour or so before it lifted. This was a problem – Kimberley closed at 6pm so we needed to depart soon. Not knowing what to do, I gave my instructor a call. He

suggested that as long as the clouds were the same or improving over the next 10 minutes, we ask ATC for a Special VFR departure (special permission to depart even if the weather is slightly below visual flying conditions). This hadn’t crossed either of our minds, since Special VFR was one of those things you read about in a textbook but never expect to actually use. It was brilliant.

I called ATC for start clearance and requested Special VFR to Wonderboom… which they granted! So a short while later, after having waved our ‘get out of Bloem free card’, we left the CTR and headed for Joburg. One thing the clouds did bring was more turbulence. The Jabiru was kitted out with a GPS and autopilot, which we’d made good use of yesterday. But the bumps were just too much for it to handle, so Sean and I resolved to handfly it all the way.

The spiderweb that is Joburg

Giving the Jabiru a drink in Beaufort West

INTO THE SPIDER’S WEB

A couple of hours later, and starting to feel green, the ‘upside-down wedding cake’ of Joburg’s airspace appeared ahead on the GPS. With so many airports dotted around, there were strict rules on where we were (and were not!) allowed to fly: A central corridor ran north to south through Joburg with Lanseria on the west, and Rand, Grand Central, Waterkloof, and others on the east. Northbound traffic had to route at 7500ft with Southbound traffic at 7000ft. Any wrong turn would mean busting someone’s airspace and a wrap on the knuckles from ATC. So Sean remained glued to the GPS while I scanned the skies for traffic.

HERE WE GO.

We hit the side of the wedding cake from the south east and entered the Special Rules area – still uncontrolled, but now inside the corridor with the city skyline starting to rise beneath. So far it wasn’t that busy (yet), with only a few aircraft in our general area. After carefully treading through we finally made it to the northern end of the cake and contacted Wonderboom Tower for a right turn into their CTR to the east. They cleared us straight inbound on a long final for Runway 11. Suddenly “not so busy” turned into a swarm around a beehive, with three more aircraft joining the queue behind us within a minute. Last month I talked about how Lindbergh managed to fly twice the distance we were going, with about half the instruments we had. Well, Lindbergh never had to deal with this, I thought, as ATC machine gunned instructions away. With aircraft on our tail, we touched down and quickly swapped gears into ‘taxi mode’. Sean already had the airport chart out and

ATC MACHINE GUNNED INSTRUCTIONS AWAY

Passing Sandton City - under the TMA in the Special Rules Area Feeling a little small as we pass the JHB CBD

On the apron at Wonderboom

our expected route to the apron. But things on Ground frequency were just as busy; with this one giving way to that one, taxiing to this intersection, turning right on that one, and so on. Eventually we made it to the General Aviation area (which was massive), at which point the controller told us to continue “at pilot’s discretion”. With almost no detail on the chart, navigating the labyrinth between the hangars was mostly guesswork, until finally we spotted a bit of pavement with an assortment of random aircraft on it. So that’s where I put it. Although we couldn’t believe it, we’d made it: from our beloved Morningstar all the way to the chaos of Joburg without a scratch. It wasn’t easy, but with the proper planning and guidance, we could do it. So the next time you hear that little voice telling you to go further than the cabbage patch, don’t let the fear of the spider’s web hinder you. Although your instructor may not be in the right hand seat, the good ones are still there for you. More on that next month. j