LAST FEW FLIGHTS WITH ETIHAD AIRWAYS

I like this company. There are about 4000 crew, came from about 200 nationalities. Communication during work all done in English but sometime when they were chit chatting, the most common languages that came out other than English were French, Italiano, Arabic, occasionally Tagalog and Malay.

RAMADAN KAREEM...

Dah nak habis pun Ramadhan, tak puas rasanya berpuasa dan bertawarikh, kerana tugas yang tak mengizinkan boleh berpuasa setiap hari dan bertarawikh disepanjang Ramadhan. Kebetulan banyak penerbangan di bulan puasa tahun ini yang kena buat menghala ke Barat, bermakna tempoh berpuasa lebih panjang, ada yang sampai 22 jam kalau di kira dari pada tempat masa berlepas dan sehingga waktu berbuka di destinasi. Semasa di dalam penerbangan, tugas juruterbang untuk menentukan waktu imsak atau waktu berbuka. Terima kasih kepada application untuk iphone seperti Muslim Pilot atau SuninFlight.

Selamat menjamu selera di paras 40000 kaki dari paras laut. Memang terbukti, application yang digunakan ini sangatlah tepat..  

Selamat Hari Raya.

Landing at the busiest airport in the world..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ki-BfTfIaXc

My last landing at the John F Kennedy Airport, as for now. This sector will be taken by the B777 fleet, so now the Airbus pilos looking for the Sao Paulo route...

SUNSET

Taking off from runway 25L at Hongkong International Airport, during the sunset.

A330

Enjoying the sunset at 34000 feet, over the Australia during my flight from Sydney to Abu Dhabi.

A340

Cycling again....

Cloudy and windy at Hongkong International Airport

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Ts0YNHClUU&feature=youtube_gdata_player

AL FORSAN, THE UAE NATIONAL AEROBATIC TEAM

The UAE Airforce sent their pilots to Itali , attached them to the Frecce Tricolori Aerobatic Team, bought 12 MB339A and formed up Al Forsan..

I have 300 hours on this plane, while serving the RMAF. Easy to fly, good aerobatic performance, high G tolerance..  sadly, our MB339A planes are in the museum now..

SPEED

Abu Dhabi to Sydney, 09 June 13, Airbus A340-600, registration A6 EHJ, the one with the F1 livery.

On the ground still, using the camera to see the body and the wheels, to ensure the plane is on the hard surface all the time, not on the grass..

 In the air, the True Air Speed, TAS indicating 481, 481 knots or 481 nautical miles per hour. Roughly 890 km per hour. The GS is the ground speed, 539 knots, around 998 km per hour. So which one is the actual speed actually?
TAS is the speed of the plane piercing through the air at that particular atmosphere or piece of air, another word, the speed of the plane in relation to that piece of air at that particular moment..
GS is the speed of the plane in relation to the surface of the earth or ground, measurement of how much the plane covered in one hour over the ground, in Nautical Miles, kts. Why the value between TAS and GS      
                                                     are different?

Here, the TAS is 474 and the GS is 580.
There are another numbers, 269/108 below the TAS and GS. This is the wind vector, bearing , or direction of the wind coming from 269 deg on the compass at the speed of 269 knots.Since the plane's heading is at 095 deg, the wind direction is coming from behind the plane, as indicated by the small arrow below the numbers.It means, the wind is pushing the plane from behind at the speed of 108 knots. The pane already travelling through the air at the speed of 474 knots, and now the wind help to push it from behind at roughly 106 kts ( not 108 because the wind direction is not exactly from behind, slightly offset) giving the total speed the plane
                                                   travelling over the surface of the Earth at 580 knots.


    The result will be the opposite if the plane is flying the other way round, the GS should be 474-106, 368 knots. This is why the flight time of a particular flight always varies, not the same all the time. It is depending either the plane is subjected to tailwind or the headwind.. not because the pilot fly purposely flying faster or slower...

COUNTER INSURGENCY

Bila dengar dan fahami kes Sulu di Sabah ni, teringat pulak zaman Kominis dulu. Bukan senang nak menghapuskan mereka , banyak jiwa terkorban dari pehak tentera dan polis. Mereka bergiat dari pedalaman hutan hutan tebal dan bebas keluar masuk negara melalui sempadan yang tak terkawal. Akhirnya Tun Mahathir terpaksalah menggunakan kaedah win win situation untuk menarik kominis kominis itu keluar dari hutan dan menyerah diri. Kaedah apa yang di gunakan, itu kena cari sendiri. Tapi salah satu cara yang agak berkesan juga adalah melalui Latihan Bersama AIR THAMAL antara Tentera Udara dari Malaysia dan Thailand, dimana bom bom digugurkan dikawasan kawasan penempatan musuh untuk memudahkah pasukan dari tentera darat untuk menggempur kem kem mereka.

Ini lah jenis pesawat yang kami gunakan untuk misi misi tersebut, Aermacchi MB339A yang di beli dari Itali. Dalam gambar ini pesawat dilengkapi dengan bom jenis MK82 500lb dan juga canon 30mm.

Di dalam menangani kes pengganas Sulu ni, kaedah yang sama mungkin boleh digunakan, iaitu kerjasama antara Tentera Filippina dan Malaysia. Tetapi kali ini Tentera Laut lah yang sepatutnya digunakan kerana pengganas Sulu ini menggunakan jalan laut untuk keluar masuk ke Sabah. TLDM kita memang sudah mempunyai Marine Corp atau PASKAL laut, untuk mengawasi persisiran pantai, mengkhadkan pergerakan pengganas dan Tentera darat seperti biasa boleh mengepung dan menyerbu mereka.

Masalah yang paling besar adalah terdapatnya orang orang awam yang sudah lama bermastautin di Sabah yang menjadi tali barut mereka. Masalah yang sama dihadapi semasa memerangi Kominis dahulu. Jadi, mungkin kaedah win win situation yang di buat olih Tun Mahathir dahulu boleh di ulang semula ? Yang semestinya mesti banyak pehak yang tak akan berpuas hati.. Kita tunggu sahaja lah apa tindakan yang selanjutnya..

My first few landing during the night were using Goose neck runway lighting, look like a big Aladdin's lamp, using kerosene.. After that, the runways lighting powered by electricity with standby generator as the back up, powering the hight intensity lights. And now, LED is being used, still on trial. My landing at Manchester Airport this morning, and as you can see, even though already bright day, the lights still clearly visible..