Today we finally departed Goose Bay for the start of our Journey across the Atlantic. It’s cold and overcast here at the airfield in Goose Bay. The wind has died down some, and at least it is not raining. We are following a low pressure system across the North Atlantic towards Reykjavik Iceland where we are expecting to overnight. Unfortunately, it looks as if we will be in the soup all day today…so no view of the ocean or of the Greenland’s ice cap.
We found out the other night after we returned to Otis AFB for maintenance that the airfield here had a gale with winds gusting up to 55 or 60 knots. There are trees down everywhere and some of the buildings have roof damage. I guess that we were lucky to get out of here when we did.
We entered the clouds after our departure at Goose Bay at about 2500 feet…and pretty well stayed either in them or just above them all the way to Narsasuek, Greenland. For the most part once we were airborne, the ride was pretty smooth but the view was disappointing to say the least.
The approach and landing into Narsasuek Greenland was, what we refer to as a white-knuckler. Rob and Hardy had to execute an instrument let down through the clouds into and airfield surrounded on three sides by high terrain…..and up a fjord. As soon as we started our decent for the arrival things got interesting. The wind was causing pretty good jolts and bumps on the way down and when we finally broke out of the clouds (at about 1500 feet) the real fun began. The wind had now picked up, and a cold rain was falling…all in winds that were now topping 45-50 knots across the ground. Turbulence is fine when you are at 25,000 feet, but on short final as we were winging over the ice burgs in the fjord-not so much fun. But Rob and Hardy did a great job flying and soon we were on the ground.
Narsasuek is remote as they come. It was about 3 degrees C outside and raining a cold, hard rain sideways. The poor refuel guys came out dressed like Nanook of the frozen north (which, given where we were, made perfect sense). We ran into this French guy in the FBO there that seemed really glad to have somebody to talk to. This poor chap had been there for 4 months and was getting ready to leave on vacation. We could tell from talking with him that time passes VERY SLOWLY here. Rob and Hardy posted our unit sticker in Base Ops so we can prove that we actually were there.
After a quick stop (we now know why the heck nobody lives in Greenland-its cold, wet, and grey) to refuel, we snapped a couple of pictures and were on our way to Iceland. The take off was as about as hairy as the landing….circling in the clouds to avoid terrain as we climbed up and out. We stayed in the clouds almost all the way to Iceland.
We found out the other night after we returned to Otis AFB for maintenance that the airfield here had a gale with winds gusting up to 55 or 60 knots. There are trees down everywhere and some of the buildings have roof damage. I guess that we were lucky to get out of here when we did.
We entered the clouds after our departure at Goose Bay at about 2500 feet…and pretty well stayed either in them or just above them all the way to Narsasuek, Greenland. For the most part once we were airborne, the ride was pretty smooth but the view was disappointing to say the least.
The approach and landing into Narsasuek Greenland was, what we refer to as a white-knuckler. Rob and Hardy had to execute an instrument let down through the clouds into and airfield surrounded on three sides by high terrain…..and up a fjord. As soon as we started our decent for the arrival things got interesting. The wind was causing pretty good jolts and bumps on the way down and when we finally broke out of the clouds (at about 1500 feet) the real fun began. The wind had now picked up, and a cold rain was falling…all in winds that were now topping 45-50 knots across the ground. Turbulence is fine when you are at 25,000 feet, but on short final as we were winging over the ice burgs in the fjord-not so much fun. But Rob and Hardy did a great job flying and soon we were on the ground.
Narsasuek is remote as they come. It was about 3 degrees C outside and raining a cold, hard rain sideways. The poor refuel guys came out dressed like Nanook of the frozen north (which, given where we were, made perfect sense). We ran into this French guy in the FBO there that seemed really glad to have somebody to talk to. This poor chap had been there for 4 months and was getting ready to leave on vacation. We could tell from talking with him that time passes VERY SLOWLY here. Rob and Hardy posted our unit sticker in Base Ops so we can prove that we actually were there.
After a quick stop (we now know why the heck nobody lives in Greenland-its cold, wet, and grey) to refuel, we snapped a couple of pictures and were on our way to Iceland. The take off was as about as hairy as the landing….circling in the clouds to avoid terrain as we climbed up and out. We stayed in the clouds almost all the way to Iceland.
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1 comment:
I'm not normally afraid of flying but I'm sure glad I wasn't in the plane with you guys. I'd never get on a plane again. Glad you made it safely. Love the photos you have been posting. I can see Mrs. C making a scrap book of all your bogs and photos when you return home:)
Your crazy soldier supporter
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