What was suppose to be a short flight above the Agean Sea and a discovery of the Orient, turn out to be the most challenging flight of the journey so far.
The details we had for the journey were showing an area of disturbed weather suppose to be leaving our destination by the time we get there and the TAF was tailing 30% chance.
Good to go....
The details we had for the journey were showing an area of disturbed weather suppose to be leaving our destination by the time we get there and the TAF was tailing 30% chance.
Good to go....
The weather is showing
The satellite confirmed some area of bad weather but this was taken the night before our departure
Our route of flight, yes the forecast was calling for thunderstorm on the civilian weather site...but again this was prepare for our briefing the night before
TAF was calling for 30% chance, with small cloud cover. this again was updated the morning of departure
Ok..lightning were depicted in the area of our flight, but again this one the night before and when we left only dots around the black sea were showing
Our actual route of flight on the approach in Istanbul. A thunder storm was slowly moving over the different intersection we were suppose to fly thru..No much help from the very busy controller into our airport.
This started to get interesting at this point. The radar was showing a number of red and purple cell, the controller was asking us to keep the speed up and we were given altitude to descent to but still at 5000 about 20 nm from touch down with a ground speed of 220 kts.
The magic word came up to us, prepare to hold.....this must be the 6th time for us on this journey..teardrop direct parallel , I guess I am ready for them now...
Of course what to add to the situation.....by mystery the radio became SILENT.....a quick look at the G1000 display showed a frequency as 120.53....where did the 3 come from and what was the actual frequency....swich back to the previous one that was given to us 10 mn prior to have confirmation tat the real one was 120.50.... We are back in the game, just in time to see a puffy cloud in front of us...turn 10 degree right, to avoid the column...we have seen enough water a icing so far..
Vector to capture final at 90 degree angle reduce to 60 and still ding 210 kts...guess what we went thru it...but now we are in view of the ground still at 5000...we do capture and then we face a wall of water in front of us...clear for the approach switch to tower. visibility in front of us is nil..
but the ground start to be seen and finally we do see the runway..altitude 1200 feet not to bad..the rain is still with us
Just have time to get a photo
We are now in Istanbul and the sun is bright and welcoming
By the way this was the transition loaded in the G1000 and the ILS data:
