Air 1st Aviation Companies, Inc. - Specializing in in the Mitsubishi MU-2 Turbo-Prop

(803) 641-9999

Saturday, August 31, 2013: Day 7 - Kuwait City-Muscat
Handler in Kuwait 9147

Kuwait has been such an easy stop; the GA (general aviation) facility was beautiful, and everyone was so easy to deal with (photo left: one of the handlers at the Kuwait International Airport). This morning again, we lifted off at our flight planned time of 0830. We climbed up to 25,000 feet, fuel burn 68 GPH and TAS is 285--5 knots short of our flight planned speed from Baseops--but we will pick that up after a short time. One thing I have learned on this trip is that if I set up the flight planned cruise speed, my estimates are within a few minutes over the entire route. In the six months preceeding this trip, I worked closely with BaseOps to get the true air speeds (TAS) and fuel burns for both normal cruise and long range cruise for N50ET very accurate, and that has really helped for the flight planning.

We are now at 25,000 feet and flying over the middle of the Persian Gulf--our route follows the Iran airspace border which is just 5 miles way--I hope this Garmin GPS is accurate! (photo right: navigating over the Persian Gulf) After 1.5 hours, we are 083113 Persian Gulf navigation display

starting to move away from the Iran border and our track now takes us over Dubai and into Oman. We landed in Muscat after a short flying day of just 2.7 hours. The fueler was there to meet us, so after refueling we moved through customs in the International Terminal then straight to the hotel. In reflecting back on our journey thus far, I can say that flying through Europe and the Middle East has been so easy. The controllers have been so courteous and polite, which has made it so easy and such a pleasure.

I am very lucky to have Mike Collins from AOPA magazine with me. Mike has done an incredible job of documenting the trip, and his photography is fantastic. Mike is so much fun to travel with and is ready to help in any and every way. Thank you to Mike and AOPA for supporting me in this trip.