African bush pilot features in UNTAMED

 Back in 2008 whilst flying in Tanzania I flew Davey Hughes from Swazi into the Selous Game reserve to hunt Buffalo. For those who have not heard of Swazi it is a new Zealand company that specializes in outdoor clothing.
On the flight into the Selous, Davey pointed out an area on a map called Sand river and wanted to have a closer look because this was where he was to be hunting and camping. He was paying for the flight and it was on the way to the destination airstrip, so there was no problem carrying out a little reconnaissance at low level.

 In 2011 Davey released a book called 'Untamed' in it he speaks about this flight into the Selous, when describing the pilot he says "he'd missed his calling as a Second World War Spitfire pilot". Slightly disconcerting to say the least. I deny that the flight departed from normal standard operating procedures...plus nowadays I claim the 'Africa' has been trained out of me...
However I feared better than Daveys description of Antanov pilots in Mongolia who were literally drinking Vodka before and during the flight!

A grainy picture from Untamed. Davey and I posing beside a Cessna 206 at Kiba airstrip in the Selous Game Reserve.

Anyway that is more than enough free advertising.

Botswana bush pilot to crop duster...not quite!

Man survives crash and blaze

After leaving Botswana I had some crazy idea of becoming a crop dusting pilot.
I got a job on the ground mixing chemicals and loading aircraft with granule fertilizer to obtain the necessary 'experience' and hopefully be a crop dusting pilot the following season.
The company who gave me the inglorious job of chemical mixing is the operator mentioned in the above article.
The pilot / owner of this outfit was lucky to hobble away from the mentioned accident....but then he is a resilient character with a genuine seventies pron star moustache to match.
All I learnt during my season on the ground was that crop dusters have plenty of incidents with there low flying all day everyday and decided I could easily be killed if I did this occupation.
I have elaborated more specifically on the lunacy and cowboy lifestyle of the crop dusting industry in my future book 'Rice, beans & flying machines'.
...After my first season I packed my bags and shipped off  to East Africa for two years flying Caravans.

Tanzania: Orbus flying eye hospital

 Orbus DC10 flying eye hospital.

 Back when I was living in Dar es Salaam with the help of my airport security pass, myself and a couple of colleagues got to have a look through this visiting DC10.
We've all seen lavishly kitted out private jets that usually belong to some oil rich Arab Sheik who has nothing better to do with his money, instead of jacuzzis, cocktail bars and kingsize beds this old DC10  is a full blown eye hospital!
It is completely run by charity, the aircraft was donated by Fedex, the pilots are volunteers from United Airlines, and runs on donations.

This is the recovery room, through those doors is the surgery we were unable to hace access as surgery was in progress. The surgery itself is super engineered, it is directly over the wings to ensure maximum stability. But then even with an aircraft parked on the ground it still moves slightly so to compensate for this movement that you and I wouldn't usually feel the surgery floor is gyro stabilized. You don't want the surgeon to slip while he operating on your eye!

Laboritory and examination room.

Theartre room...the only screening on this day was live eye surgery

Our quick mock up flight crew....its quite multi-cultural a Spanish flight engineer, Iranian first officer (He'd prefer to be called Persian) and myself a Kiwi captain (I wish).

Personally I believe this flying eye hospital is amazing going the world to developing nations (Poor places) and bringing sight to disadvantaged people who otherwise would not have the opportunity to see.

70th Anniversary of the bombing of Darwin

 The MV Neptuna exploding.

Now I am definately not Australian! But my wife is and I live in Australia, so I have to tolerate them. Today was the 70th Anniversary of when Japanese aircraft first attacked Australian soil in World War Two, my wife and I went to the ceremony on the Esplanade in Darwin...One must show respect for such historical events.

The army did an impressive display with artillery pieces (Rattled my ear drums)....However Australia has a reasonably impressive Air force (especially if you are comparing it against New Zealand) and I being a self confessed aviation geek was expecting atleast a fly past of F18's (really fast jets), beautiful old warbirds or even the Roulettes (Air force display team). No the Airforce did a fly over in an old lumbering Orion (Survellance aircraft) may as well done it in a Saab 340.

Back in October last year the RAAF (Aussie air force) did a formation fly past with twenty F18's for a whole bunch of bogans watching V8 supercar racing on the Goldcoast!







In my next post I promise not have so much of a whinge, it was indeed a moving ceremony in rememberance of Australian wartime events.

My old ebook / pamphlet: Wanting to fly in Africa?

Even though my old Ebook or should I say large pamphlet 'Wanting to fly in Africa?' has not been on sale for over eight months I still get plenty of emails from pilots and various other individuals enquiring about its availablility.

Because I no longer fly in Africa it became logistically impossible for me to keep the ebook accurately updated.

However even though majority of the content is outdated there may be plenty of uselful information for pilots comptenplating heading to Africa in search of bush flying jobs packed with adventure.

For those of you still interested in the 'Wanting to fly in Africa' ebook please email at africanbushpilot@gmail.com and I will be more than happy to forward you a copy free of charge.

Rwanadan Presidents Falcon 50 grave site

Falcon 50 remains, near Kigali airport, Rwanda.

 What is left these days of Rwandan president Juvénal Habyarimana's Falcon 50 wreckage which was shot down killing him and the president of Burundi whilst on final approach to Kigali airport in 1994. After this assassination the largest genocide in recent history took place. There is not alot left of this wreckage...I am surprised there is this much left of the wreckage after eighteen years. We have all seen the movie 'Lord of war' where an Antonov is completely dismantled overnight!

Africa flashbacks... Late one afternoon enroute from Nairobi, Kenya to Mwanza, Tanzania I took this photo looking North over the Masai Mara bordered by thunderstorms.

Olduvai Gorge

 Occasionally when I had an empty aircraft, lots of time and flying over a world famous area like the Serengeti plains I would take advantage of the the situation with an impromptu scenic flight for yours truly. If anybody ever asked why I took so long (no one ever did), I could just blame weather or headwinds...

Featured above is Olduvai Gorge on the border of the Serengeti Plains National Park and Nogorongoro Conservation Area. In this gorge some of the worlds oldest Humanoid fossils and primitive tools have been discovered. What a hard start for ancient man! If I was ancient man I would have preferred to be somewhere like New Zealand where there are no angry potential man eating predators with big teeth, just a bunch of flightless birds.

Main road through the Serengeti, one must always watch out for the potential two million four legged pedestrians.

Bunny Chow

Bunny Chow

Now any budget conscious traveller who has spent time in Maun, Botswana or a poor pilot saving their pennies for beer instead of food will have had an encounter with the Okavango River lodge and its culinary delight called Bunny Chow. The River lodge served the perfect meal for bachelors (Maun has many) it was a great poverty stricken substitute for a Sunday roast. It had all the basics which is staple to the diet a single man....carbs and protein.
Here in Darwin (In Australia) there is a few degenerates who can lay claim to having once been plane drivers/bush pilots in the Okavango. It was one of these pilots who suggested we get together and recreate our favourite delicacy from Maun.
It's not hard to throw together: basically you curry up any meat whether it be beef, goat, donkey, dog, cat or your nearest convenient roadkill and pour it into a hollowed out loaf of bread (sliced bread doesn't work unless you glue it back together).
The River lodge were onto a winner it was soo spicy on occasion one would sweat from every pore. This increased ones intake of beer in a vain attempt to rehydrate. The problem would be compounded when the barmen would announce they had sold out of single shots and could only sell double shots for whatever you were drinking. I was naturally sceptical, but more than obliging to having the potency of whatever I was drinking at the time doubled.

Cockpit etiquette

Sunday evening sunset above the Timor Sea

The POH (Pilot operating handbook) otherwise known as the Northern Territory News a must have in the cockpit for any decent sized cruise. Now I don't know how to break this to the children of the world who were expecting to get chocolate eggs for Easter it seems the Easter bunny was lunch for this python. Truly world changing front page news.

Now these may just look like Eclipse mints to you, however they may as well be on the MEL (Minimum Equipment List - basically things that are a must for a flight to commence like wings, engines and Eclipse mints) As a joke these humble mints have been nicknamed HTFU pills (Harden The F#@* Up pills) I see them as a distraction to stop plane drivers like myself from eating too many white bread sandwiches out of the galley.

Saab 340 for Dummies!

Driving/flying a Saab 340 can't be that hard once you've read this? Well this definitely breaks it down for a simple boy who spent a few too many years bashing around the African bush flying by the seat of my pants.

Saab reflection prior to tow