Changes are afoot!

I'M BACCCKKKK! After a almost year absence from this blog, I'm finally finding the time to begin posting again. Albeit I'm doing it late at night when the baby and everyone else is asleep. Anyway, I felt now is the right time to make this blog active again. To my original "7" followers of this blog, I say thanks for sticking around. To all those who visit or just happen to see my site, I also say thanks for stopping and reading. I greatly appreciate it.

As the title suggests, things are afoot where I work at. As noted in the local media and on various aviation news blogs, my company, Hawaii Island Air are going to get a "new" aircraft type. Since our aging fleet of Dash-8-100's are getting up there in time, we have decided to invest in ATR's! The company is going ahead and getting both models, the 42's and 72's. I've worked with and on the 42 models in the early '90's with another now defunct airline and i actually love ATR-42. Not to familiar with the 72's, but I'm sure it's not much diffrence.

So, I'll be deep in the transition of this aircraft within our fltops dept so I will do a regular series on this event over the course of the change over. I'll also write about anything and everything else that goes on in dispatch as well as at HNL and in aviation as well. Look forward to writing and taking pictures again and thanks for stopping by. Look forward to your comments on my blog. Till the next post...Aloha!

Finishing Up the Heavy Check

So with the heavy check almost completed, maintnenace puts a new set of props on the aircraft #1 engine.

This aircraft is scheduled to return to service on 04 Nov. The #2 engine in the back awaits her new engine and set of props as well. After this, time for a run up and check out. 

BIRD STRIKE!!

Okay, so this kind of stuff happens on occasion. Areas like MKK and JHM are prone to having their fair share, perhaps more, of birds in and around the vicinity of the airport. Flying into these birds does happen. Most of the times when it does, it really a non event. Meaning that the bird takes a glancing blow either off the aircraft body or at times strikes the props and gets turned into a "flash of crimson".
 But today was a little different. During the crew walk around after landing in MKK they discovered this:

The F/O was looking in the intake and found the feathers and a small blood trail leading into the intake.

So they checked the engine intake bypass and found this

(GRAPHIC PHOTOS...LOOK AT YOUR OWN RISK!!)

So, we got a birds carcass in the intake, but did ANY portion of the bird get sucked into the engine? Well, now we in dispatch pretty much ground the aircraft on MKK and get maintenance control to send an mechanic and inspector out to the aircraft on the next available flight to check. FOD or Foreign Object Damage is a serious matter and is treated that way at EVERY AIRLINE!

Two hours later...after a thorough inspection, the aircraft is released by maintenance and we can now re-dispatch the aircraft from MKK back to HNL to finish the remainder of the line, albeit 2 hrs delayed!

As for our feathered friend, well this is all that maintenance found of him...

Not much left. Not even a cat would want this as a snack!

The best thing was that no one was hurt. The plane landed safely and we didn't have to replace an engine. Even after this happened, the station's customer service was already rebooking passengers and trying to minimize the delay they would experience.

Unfortunately these things do occur and the crews are capable of handling it and the maintenance staff is capable of getting the aircraft back flight ready.

Heading Home with a side of Lanai

After a short and quick 15 minute turn in JHM/PHJH, we depart for HNL/PHNL.

We reach our cruising altitude for the 32 minute flight back. Nothing to look at during this flight because of the clouds below us at FL050. On this flight, we fly in the channel north of the island of Lanai (LNY/PHNY) and south of Molokai. Normally it's a great flight to see the middle islands, not today.

At 30 miles out we call the field as we are cleared down to FL025. The clouds around Honolulu are now mainly over the mountains with some high broken to overcast over the south shore. HNL tower clears us for the visual on the "channel approach" which is we fly towards the entrance to Pearl Harbor then make a visual right turn from base to runway 8L. This approach is favored by all the interisland pilots because of its close proximity to the taxiways that lead to the interisland ramp.

We start our turn to final for 8L. Since HNL is a shared field with Hickam/Pearl Harbor Air Base (combined field now for the military), it affords some great views of Pearl with the Arizona Memorial and the USS Missouri in the distance and the Hickam flight line.

Showers again over Keehi Lagoon 2 miles away but noticeably HNL had some rain as to the sheen of water on 8L as we continue our landing.

After the landing, we get nailed by the rain that we saw as we taxied in to the gate.

20 minutes later were on the go again heading back to MKK and LNY.

WOW! what a difference 20 minutes make. The sun is now shining over the south shore of Honolulu. The tourist are getting their money's worth now that the rain has passed and the beaches are sunny. Ala Moana Beach Park is visible as the long stretch of sandy beach in the foreground with famous Diamond Head in the distance.

This leg goes to Molokai first, and since I covered that in Part one of this blog, I'm skipping to Lanai.

The approach to the airport starts on the south side of the island. The first thing you notice is the cliffs on the south shore. Rising 500 feet above the sea, it's both beautiful and imposing.

LNY was originally owned by the Dole Company and was nicknamed for many years "The Pineapple Island". That's because of most of the flat level land from the south shore cliffs to the town of Lanai was covered with Pineapple fields. A good portion of the pineapples that were shipped around the world came from Lanai. With changing times, labor cost for growing pineapples became more expensive, so after the fields had grown their last crop, they were left vacant. David Murdoch purchased the island from Dole and now his company, Castle & Cooke, runs the island and has developed two world class resorts to replace agriculture as the sole source of island income for its residents who were left without jobs when Dole pulled out of the island.

On glideslope...Lanai is one of those fields that you can have strong winds to low ceiling and visibility in a rather short time. The airport sits about 600 feet ASL and because of the mountains in the north, east and west sides, can cause clouds to "sit" in what we refer to as "the bowl".

Welcome to bright and sunny Lanai!

We depart Lanai and within a short 30 minute flight were back in Honolulu. This is the approach to 4R which takes us over 8R/26L better known as the "Reef Runway".

After landing we taxi to via "Bravo" taxiway to cross 8L/26R at "Golf". We wait while an American Airlines 757 lands. just behind the tail taxing up to the interisland terminal is Hawaiian Airlines new Airbus. Just one more round trip and I'm done for the day.

Hope you enjoyed this little series. Thanks for reading!

The Short Hop!

So on to the next destination , Kapalua-West Maui or just Kapalua Airport (JHM/PHJM). The rain that was north of the field in Molokai still held there as we departed. As we begin our departure, with the standard left climbing turn to FL050, thence to the VOR heading 100 degrees to BOGEE INT.

We start to board our flight for the departure from MKK.

As you can see the clouds which are now covering the interior of Molokai to the left and extending east as we climb thru FL020 to our cruise altitude of FL050 (this portion of the flight is only 15 min long from block to block)

We continue eastward flying over Kaunakakai and the wharf  (It's that little piece of land just at the very middle bottom of the F/O's window). The crew is busy at this point being as we are about to go IMC.

Though directly in front is in overcast conditions, just south of Molokai, the channel is clear and you can see Lanai island.

The overcast conditions that await us over West Maui. The mountains of east Molokai are to the left of us and shrouded in heavy clouds and rain.

"In the soup". We are now IMC and established on the 100 degree heading to BOGEE INT which is about 3 minutes away.

Here's the approach procedure into JHM.

 

At 24.4 DME and about FL029 from the MKK VOR we start to break out of the clouds.

 

As we get lower and closer, the coast line becomes visible. The approach into JHM is a rather tricky one for the crews. For noise abatement, aircraft must cross the shoreline no lower than 1800 ft. Only upon crossing the shore line may the turn from base onto final begin. So this almost seems to like your diving into the airport.

 

Approaching the shore line the field is visible thru the rain just near the right edge of the window.

Crossing the shoreline and turning onto final for RWY 02.

  

Established on final. RWY 02 just ahead on the edge of the rain.

One thing about the approach into JHM is that the runway is on 3000 ft long. There are ravines on either end of the runways. The winds are usually always a direct crosswind which includes wind shear on the short final. When I was a flight attendant, I used to tell passengers that landing in Kapalua was like landing on the deck of an aircraft carrier. Quick, violent and unforgettable!

Fifteen minutes after departing Molokai, here we are in a rainy Kapalua-West Maui.

Jumpseat Requalification

So, May/June for me is recurrent month. All of my dispatcher currency is due in late May till early June. Since I still had ground school to contend with, I decided to take a day and do my jumpseat requal first.

As dispatchers, we are required by FAR to occupy the jumpseat for five hours of observation. An hour can be substituted for every additional takeoff and landing down to two and a half hours. I decided to do our HNL-MKK-JHM-HNL and HNL-MKK-LNY-HNL legs with an additional HNL-JHM-HNL to requal on which based on the time, would give me 2.9 hours.

Show time for this was at 0555 at dispatch. I would be flying with Capt. Johnson and F/O Feddersohn and rounding out our merry crew was FA Muldowney in the back. N805WP would be our ship assigned to this trip. After the brief by the dispatcher we proceeded to our aircraft for the pre-flight and then taxi over to our gates at the commuter terminal.

Once loaded, with pax and commissary we taxied out to 8L via Lima and was cleared for immediate departure.

 Once airborne, we proceeded to PHMK/MKK airport. This early morning the ceiling was at about FL022 so we were in IMC conditions shortly after take off. But above FL040, it cleared out nicely.

Left turn to proceed direct the MKK VOR.  

This portion of the trip, HNL-MKK is only 17 min flight time, so it's a real busy flight for the crews. This morning's flight is no exception.

Our radar "paints out" the island of Molokai Because of the amount of clouds on the approach, we will be doing the MKK VOR A approach into MKK.

 As we begin to break thru the clouds, we can see that the south shore is clear of clouds and we can see the MKK airport in the distance. From here its just a few more minutes before were established on the approach and we are landing. Like I said, a real busy leg for the crews.

Looking along Molokai south shore towards Kaunakakai.

Established on the base leg of our approach, The airport is in the clear of the weather that we had been in shortly after departure from HNL.

On short final to RWY 05, weather is starting to close in from the north

Welcome to Molokai!

Next blog...off to Kapalua-West Maui

Awaiting its fate

All alone on the south ramp infront of our hanger sits N808WP. A Dash-8-103, serial #26 and built in 1986, has come to an end of its life as the airframe has timed out. Removed of it's engines and other vital parts it awaits it's fate to come.

"Old School" Dispatching

If you're an aircraft dispatcher nowdays, you probably use all the latest in dispatching software and tracking devices to make your job easier. Well, where I work at, since we're a small outfit, we don't need to use all the high speed, high tech gadgets that the bigger airlines use. Sure we have computer's and we've designed our own programs to make our releases and figure weights and burns out, but what I really like about how we do things is we interact with the crews. Every morning, crew arrive in dispatch and we give them a briefing and discuss things person to person. Makes for better dispatch resource management.

So here the dispatcher station. Briefing counter to the right and a great view (when the aircraft is not parked there) of HNL/PHNL and RWY 4R/22L

A little closer look shows the important stuff like ICED COFFFEE!!!

If I didn't have one of these in the morning, I'd be dead in the water!

 Up on the far left screen screen we have weather-

satellite loops and printed weather reports, on the center screen
releases and fuel slips and more weather via Pilot Brief on the far right.

Here's what the release look like. Three copies printed ot per crew. Our releases are are done for the whole trip line and are amended as necessary during the days ops. New release are faxed out to crews (No ACARS system here)

Flights throughout the day are tracked via the GANTT. Alot of airlines use a computer based system to track flights, but since we have a smaller ops this works just as great. Since the islands are within a 30 minute flight time (the exception being the Big Island of Hawaii) we can contact the aircraft via the base radio (air to ground) or if further out, via AIRCELL.

Another day in the dispatch office

Here's the wall as you enter the Flight Ops offices at the hanger. Cory from marketing did the work. It came out great. Thanks Cory!

This is the second day of a 5 day work week. An early start at 0315. Here's the view from my dispatcher desk overlooking the airport and our ramp. (HNL/PHNL)

I get the AWESOME sunrises from my office with the early start...

(I can't help it that I work in such beautiful place!!)

The 0315 shift is my favorite to work. I get to start everyone's day.

(Sorry about the grainy pics...I'm using my iPhone camera till I get my digital camera operational again)