Flight to an Offshore Volcano

[cwyckham]

A few days ago I had my last New Zealand flight before I move back to Canada. I certainly ended on a high note. I had a 3.4 hour flight from Ardmore airport near Auckland to White Island, an active volcano 27 nm off the east coast of New Zealand's North Island.

I made the flight solo in a Grumman AA1C. I was a bit nervous about the overwater portion and really couldn't get high enough to remain in gliding distance of land, so I nominated a SAR time 15 minutes in the future and just kept updating it. I also kept a close eye on the fishing boats. One thing I like about the Grumman is that you can slide back the canopy in flight, so there's no risk of being trapped in a ditching situation.

I shot a short video looking into the crater. It was shot at 500' and 100 knots. If you look closely, you can see my head scanning instruments and for traffic, though.

Chris

 

[tonycondon]

very cool chris, im on super slow computer for the weekend. will have to check out the video on monday.

 

[colomtnflyer]

White Island used to be a sulfur mine, till it blew up. Everybody on the island was killed in the explosion, except a single dog.... (or so the story goes...)

 

[Dave Krall CFII]

Nice, I like the reflections off the glass that are often present in cockpit videos and PIX. It'd be fun to taxi a seaplane around there.