CamTom12 wrote:Here's the modified route:

1. Fairbanks to Whitehorse to Watson Lake to Ft Nelson.

2. Watson Lake to Ft St John to Prince George to Kamloops to Oroville, WA (customs) to Priest River, ID.

3. Priest River to Kalispell, MT to Black Hills, SD to Bassett, NE (placeholder for an RON pending a better recommendation)

4. Bassett to Sikeston, MO to Huntsville, AL

Turns into roughly 8 hour flying days for four days. Not what I had imagined when planning this trip but work requirements dictate otherwise. Either way it's been a blast so far and Will continue to be that way.

Are there any details you know on the legs I should be aware of?

Are there any better RON options near Bassett, NE?


EDIT: for clarity, each line is one day's planned leg, with the last city being the planned overnight stop. Please let me know if you have a dive one way or the other!

Is there a reason you're planning to cross the Continental Divide three times? From Fort Nelson, I'd try to head as far southeast as the smoke will permit. Or run down the east side of the divide past Red Deer to Cut Bank at the least..... Customs there, then east. Lots of rocks on the route you have, and longer distances. If weather was good, I'd launch out of Ft Nelson to the SE, and pick up Customs out in the prairie.

Fly safe.

MTV

UpNorth,
I'll send you a PM.

Renegade,
I've got a comfortable 650nm range with a good reserve (and no winds, haha).

MTV,
I tried planning for the lowest altitude crossings, and I'm planning to overnight at Priest River, ID at my Dad's house which kind of drove the route more direct south through Canada. Would you recommend the trench and cutting Fort Nelson and Fort St John?

The trench( Watson Lake to McKenzie) is 309 nautical miles and can be done at low level. Lots of emergency strips if required. If you have the fuel it is an easy and relaxing flight.

With that range I would definitely look at the trench or the Dease lake/ railroad bed route. Will save you many hours. Beautiful country to fly through as well

175 magnum wrote:The trench( Watson Lake to McKenzie) is 309 nautical miles and can be done at low level. Lots of emergency strips if required. If you have the fuel it is an easy and relaxing flight.

Yes to this. The route you posted is pretty circuitous. This would save a lot of miles, weather permitting, as long as you're headed for Priest River. Gas is really the only issue on the trench route if you're short of fuel.

MTV

Camtom,

We leaned to peak by RPM before takeoff at any density altitude with 0-320 and 0-360 Lycoming engines. We got 3,000 hours on those engines, on the pipeline, with good fuel economy. We operated low level all the time.

Contact

Distance wise is it not shorter to cut southwest through the prairies rather then heading south through BC? Not as much to see for sure, but should be shorter I think.

Cam, the trench is a good route!! Saves a lot of time!
Darwin and Wendy @ Scoop Lake are good folks if you have to find a place to land, just buzz the strip to chase all the elk off!!
Have fun!!

Paperwork is filed in OKC. In a holding pattern for the email with the temp cert.

Might be cutting WA out and sticking over the prairie, clearing in cut bank or somewhere like that. While I sit here waiting to depart and time keeps passing, I'm continually modifying the route to skip detours for family visits and focus on the route pointing southeast to Alabama.

Fingers crossed we can depart soon!

I hope this reaches you after you have left with the temporary certificate.

In the seventies, after Regan fired the controllers, I was the successful bidder on a fire watch in Utah. The contracting officer, a lady, called me to be sure I had an Air Taxi Certificate. I explained that I had checked, "Will obtain certificate," on the bid form and that I would obtain one. She said, "But the contract starts in three months." I said, "The last time I obtained an Air Taxi Certificate, it took one hour and the GADO secretary typed my hand printed application while we flew the check ride." She said, "It now takes a minimum of six months to get an Air Taxi Certificate and non compliance with the contract is a 2% penalty." I didn't say anything.

She explained that they had not updated their bid form to demand a check for "Have Air Taxi Certificate." She said she was awarding the contract to the next highest bidder and not fining me for non-compliance. She said my bid was almost unacceptably low and that the government expect to pay ten times the normal market price.

The government works in mysterious ways. The civilian side has no mission orientation whatsoever. Nobody can be fired and nobody is going to jail.

No dice today, Jim.

Hopefully tomorrow morning!


I gotta say, there's far worse places to be "stuck." It's been really nice to be back home

I didn't look in depth, but seems like you might be able to get out of there today if the paperwork is done. Load up on sandwiches and coffee from Lu Lu's bakery. Be safe.

Brett

Talked to a friend last night who'd crossed the prairies MN to Regina, to Red Deer the last couple days. He was IFR and said it was solid thick smoke all the way to near Red Deer. You may be best coming down the Trench and crossing the mtns in MT, then cross the prairies south.

Good weather here in SW MT

MTV

Made it into Cheyenne yesterday afternoon from Dallas. As soon as we got into eastern Colorado got into a misty smoke mess. Low level and 3 miles vis across the plains. Couldn't make it over the hill to Laramie. Now stuck in Cheyenne in a combination of smoke and a 1 degree temp/dew point spread. Hoping it will clear just enough for me to follow the highway out of here to the west into the clear weather. Western Wyoming looks good.

I appreciate the PIREPs, retooling the route. Still waiting on paperwork.

Paperwork is in!

I filed the flight plan, coordinated customs, and called Canada FSS to verify I was good there. Then I walked outside to this:



Blew in over the last 45-60 min. 3/4 mi vis. Woof.

At this rate I'd better start calling commercial air carriers to get a ticket home.

^^Yeah, here too today. Looks like you made your way to Chena Marina. Lots of worse places to wait it out. I hope things start going your way real soon. Cheers

Thanks Brother.

Here's looking North:



Looking South:

Yep, I remember those views as well.....2004 was as smoky as all get out.

Hang in there as long as you can.....a wind change may blow it out of there. Friends flew into FAI yesterday from Tok and had no smoke. Pray for a wind shift, that stuff must be local.

MTV

Here is some weather cams to look at for BC and the Yukon
http://www3.telus.net/ruping/webcams/pyrwebcams.html
KenW