Arnhem Land safari (2)

I had the weekend in Nhulunbuy: went for a walk on Saturday morning and spent the rest of the day studying for my instructor's rating, then on Sunday tagged along with my host person for church and visiting some Yolngu families whom she knew. More study on Monday and Tuesday, along with a training flight of my own (learning how to fly the aeroplane from the right-hand seat). The students really enjoyed their time with their MAF host families out in the different outstations.

Then on Wednesday it was time to start the long, long journey home!

Old MAF hangar at Gove airport - now used as storage, while the offices are used for MAF passenger services

New MAF hangar at Gove airport - used for maintenance

Stopping at Gan Gan airstrip on our way back

Airstrip and community at Balma, Arnhem Land

Overtaking one of the other students

Refuelling at Burketown, our overnight stop

The crew back at Mareeba - me, Dave, Marcus, Tali and Keith

Arnhem Land safari (1)

Late last week I was invited to tag along with the CPL students' annual safari to Arnhem Land - an 8 day round trip of approximately 1600 nautical miles from Mareeba to Gove, the main base for the MAF Arnhem Land programme.

We left Mareeba on Wednesday morning 22 May and arrived late on Thursday. I had been scheduled to fly with each of the three students as they swapped around the different aircraft - two C172s and one C182. It was interesting to see some of the things they had been taught already at PPL level, and also how different their navigation training and procedures were to mine. Terrain and weather are big factors, and of course in this part of Australia, are completely different to New Zealand. The terrain is completely flat, and prominent features are few and far between, unless you are near the coast. Then, because there's hardly any clouds, you can choose your cruising level based on the most favourable wind and your aircraft climb performance. Then to get from A to B you just dial it into the GPS, take off, point your nose in the right direction, and wait. (Makes me very thankful that I did my flight training in NZ, where you always had something to do, in terms of negotiating cloud and terrain!)

Here are some photos - enjoy!

Pre-trip planning took the students several days

Refuelling by truck at Normanton

River systems near the coast of the Gulf of Carpenteria

Lawn Hill Gorge, near Adel's Grove (our overnight stop)

Early morning pre-flight inspections, day 2

Students considering directions from Hell's Gate

Estuary on the way to Numbulwar

C182 in flight

On the ground at Numbulwar, preparing for our final leg

Low cloud leaving Numbulwar - from Georgetown to here you would have gone blind looking for a cloud

Diverting inland to avoid rain showers

Arriving overhead Gove

This morning we were treated to a tour of Nhulunbuy and Yirrkala by Clare, our MAF contact who has been helping organise our trip at this end. Nhulunbuy is a bauxite mining town and the largest in Arnhem Land, while Yirrkala is an indigenous community nearby. MAF owns several properties in both towns and staff who are based here may be allocated a house in either one.

After our tour we made our way to the airport again, where the students were flown by MAF to two different communities where MAF has outstations - one student has gone to Ramingining and two to Galiwinku (Elcho Island). They will spend the weekend there and fly back sometime on Monday. In the meantime I am staying in Gove to study for my flight instructor theory exam. There's a chance I may get to take part in a church flight on Sunday, but it will be weather-dependent.

Beach at Yirrkala

Yirrkala Art Centre

Students' plane departing for their respective outstations

Stoney Creek and Mount Baldy

The weekend before last I went for a walk at Stoney Creek. I was under the trees 99% of the time so it was very pleasant.

The aptly-named Stoney Creek - the photo doesn't do it justice.
This was the spot where I stopped for lunch - the trees were so high, it felt like a cathedral

Huge trees and tree-huggers

View of Cairns from 'Glacier Rock' (Mt Whitfield in the centre)

I saw some more critters while I was there...

Cruiser butterfly

Skink

My first snake! According to the google, it's a non-venomous common tree snake

Last weekend I walked up Mount Baldy, behind Atherton, with some other MAF people. The view was well worth the effort!

View of Atherton from Mount Baldy

Standardisation: operational flight

The end of the standardisation course is in sight!

Last Thursday (flight #6) we had a practise 'proficiency base check' which is a cunningly crafted series of scenarios that enables the instructor to test us on a number of abnormal manoeuvres and emergency procedures (as well as the soft skills like problem solving, situational awareness, workload management etc.). Now we are well into the second half of our flight training, which is more of the operational side of things.

After the base check we started venturing further afield - flight #7 focused on low level terrain flying, and flight #8 was a revision of IFR procedures (i.e. flying on instruments).

Today we went to two airstrips we hadn't been to before. Katherine from the communications team came along as a passenger, to experience for herself what it's like flying in a MAF plane and to see the sorts of things we get up to on standardisation. The pictures she took are featured in this Facebook post (and are copied below for posterity).

Two more training flights, a practise 'proficiency line check' on Monday, and then we are all done!

Getting ready for take-off

Dirt airstrip at Almaden

On the ground at Almaden

Removing anthills

The small town of Tolga and Lake Tinaroo in the distance

Critters and crooners

I've been collecting some pictures of local fauna... time to share them!

Gecko on the ceiling in my house

Skink seen on my walk at Walsh's Pyramid

Well-camouflaged grasshopper seen at Walsh's Pyramid. It tried to fool me by
swaying back and forth, but there was no wind...

Spider that had taken up residence on an MAF plane. It was huge! (the rivets are about 4 cm apart)

North Queensland day moth, also seen at Walsh's Pyramid. After landing they would turn anticlockwise to face downwards - every time!

Red-tailed black cockatoos, seen at Kurrimine Beach

Sulphur-crested cockatoo at a local park (not too hard to photograph - they are everywhere)

'Kookaburra sits on the electric wire...'

Rainbow lorikeets in a tree over the back fence. Also function as a 6:30am alarm clock

Why no snakes, you may ask? Because I haven't seen one yet.

Standardisation: exercise at Mount Garnet

A couple of days ago our flight training syllabus saw us going to Mount Garnet to practise some emergency take-off procedures. On the way we were given a taste of some of the low flying syllabus (which we will tackle more of tomorrow - flight #7). I got to practise a low-level pass at the airstrip - 80 knots at 10 ft off the ground, through which I was supposed to be looking for anthills but left that job largely up to my passengers and focused on flying the plane! It was a good day out, and one of the few where we've each been a passenger while the other was flying. Here are some pics from the day:

Low level navigation exercise on the way to Mount Garnet

Instructor Simon and fellow trainee Jaap preparing the airstrip for our exercise:
setting out distance markers and removing anthills

Action shot during the aborted take-off exercises

GA8 kicking up dust as normal procedure in a short-field takeoff

Caravan doing the same