Too close for missiles.... switching to guns....

Last Sunday, me, Jonky, Nicole and Jeff were supposed to fly to Lubang. Jeff was supposed to be my passenger, while Nicole's passenger was Jonky. Due to some unforseen events, Jeff had to go home early. Out of the blue Nicole suggested suddenly suggested Baler and borrowed my camera. I obliged and soon found myself looking for a passenger. It was sunday, all the students that were there have their own flight schedules and didn't want to go. Good thing Capt Rey didn't have a schedule and asked him if he wanted to join us.

Nicole, flying 1053 with Jonky, took off ahead of us. After 5 minutes, me and Capt. Rey aboard 8831, took-off. RP-C1053 received a new engine, and couldn't climb further than 3000'. We opted to go higher since our TAS will be faster on higher altitudes. It was a routine flight en-route to Baler. Since the other aircraft didn't climb at higher altitudes, they were forced to follow the valley en-route to Dingalan allowing us to catch up with them. From 6000' we were able to see them below us.

I radioed Nicole that I'll go closer to her and asked her to maintain altitude, heading and airspeed. Formation flight is very demanding to pilots involved, constant communication is required whilst flying the plane as precise as possible. Altitude, heading, airspeed and power setting should be nailed on the desired spot. Visibility should be excellent when trying to fly in formation. After 20 minutes of fun and pretending to be a cast in Fly Boys or Top Gun, we soon saw the beach of Baler and broke our formation.

We allowed Nicole to land first whilst we circled over the city. In less than 30 minutes we were in Bay's Inn enjoying the nice sea breeze whilst eating our lunch :)

I shall return....

A friend of mine was back here in the Philippines for a short break. Arthur, works in Singapore and booked a flight with me. Me and Arthur loves to travel, I was with him and a couple of friends when we toured Kuala Lumpur. Our next destination, Corregidor. The island fortress is just less than 50 nautical miles south west of Clark. The last time I was at the island was two weeks ago with Kozo.

The short flight took us over GuaGua, Mt. Samat, and the oil depots at Bataan. Aside from trying to fly for the first time on a light aircraft, Arthur wanted to test his brand new SLR camera. For this trip, he managed to take more than 300 pictures. Taking a photographer with you on a flight is really worth the trip :)

After 40 minutes of flying, we started our descent to Corregidor. The island’s short and unpaved runway is located on the east end of the island. Ravine on both ends of the runway and often times winds are strong and gusty. Wind cone shifts a couple of degrees to the right then to the left with different wind velocity. Runway 08’s approach has rising terrain on the right, creating turbulence wind shear and gusts. As we were on our final approach, a nasty wind shear was thrown to us. From 55 knots (Indicated Airspeed), it dropped suddenly to 40 knots causing the stall warning to alarm. You have to be quick on the rudder and power in cases like this. I even had to prepare the week before by practicing strong crosswind touch and go’s at Omni.

Just imagine how difficult it was for the American Pilots who landed there at night time, with no lighting during World War II!!! After landing, I described how hard the landing to Arthur and quickly celebrated our second chance in life. We headed immediately to the hotel to satisfy our hungry stomachs. The buffet caused 4 USD per head and the food was great. We also booked an island tour for 8 USD.

The island tour took us around the island for two and a half hours. One would see big artilleries invested by the Americans, but was of little use during the world war. The guns faced China Sea, but the Japanese invaded the island from Bataan. The ruins were a testimony on how hard the Japanese bombarded the island.

The tour was really worth every penny. The driver even brought us back to the airport. I did my pre-flight and soon found ourselves lining up again on runway 08. Before I pushed the throttle, I recited a short prayer. Taking-off from Corregidor has almost the same risk as landing on the island. You are at a low airspeed and trying to climb as fast as you can. A nasty wind shift/wind shear/gust will be very dangerous because you are closer to the ground.

The flight back to Clark was uneventful. Omni was closed already because of the drag race and we were given clearance to land on Clark’s largest runway, 20 Left. After flying on gusty winds at Corregidor, the 12 knots quartering crosswind somehow became a walk in the park.

Art, Where's our next destination???