This Past Week's Flights

FRIDAY:  2 patients and 2 chaperones shuttled to the Bongolo Hospital!  It was a bit surprising, but the passengers covered the operational costs of it all!  It was a bit last minute, but, as we get our air evacuation op's up and going, we’ll see more and more last minute flights and need to be prepared.

Every half hour I document readings of oil pressure & temp, fuel flow, cylinder head temp, exhaust gas temp, etc.  This is thanks, mainly, to a great little engine monitor called a JPI EDM-700 (see picture).  We’ve been seeing really uniform readings.  We’ve got a great machine.

 

I’ve rotated in some fuel that was purchased previously with recently purchased fuel. Filtering is done with every single drop that goes in the tank.  I’m really watching the fuel quality/handling issues. 

 

So, the blending of fuel is all done in the right wing tank of the aircraft in keeping with standard op’s from many mission aviation org's.  In this way, for critical times of flight (takeoff/landing) the left tank is used.  During cruise, the right tank is burned.  Also- never less than 10 gallons in any tank at any given time- over twice what Cessna calls “unusable”. This is in keeping with MSI’s prescription.  In all, it’s working great. 

 

I was in Nigeria on Monday and Tuesday helping my German friend, Egmont, and his agricultural company that had their 2^nd aircraft stuck there.  So, he flew us up there in their cool twin turbo prop (a Piper Cheyenne), we stayed the night, and then the next day I flew their smaller twin engine aircraft (Beechcraft Baron) back to Gabon (over the Atlantic for some of that).

That's the update for now!  I'll be posting all of January's stats in my newsletter (sign up your email on the right to receive it).