Three T182Ts Are The First Of 34 Cessnas To Seed The Afghan Air
Force
It was an unforgettable flight. Carl Gustafson, a First Officer
with Jet Blue Airways out of Long Beach and a volunteer at Flabob
Airport, got a little more excitement than he anticipated in flying
a Cessna Skylane to Shindand, Afghanistan. Gustafson was one of a
flight of three that helped launch a new Afghan Air Force. He was
joined by professional ferry pilot Brian Quindt and retired Delta
pilot, Jeff Hall, who also flew Cessna Skylanes halfway around the
world. The three Cessna T182T’s will be used as primary
trainers by the Afghans.
They will eventually be joined by three other T182T’s and
28 Grand Caravans, all part of an $88.5 million U.S. grant to the
Afghan military. This marks the first time Afghanistan has had its
own flight training operation.
Gustafson, and the others departed St. John’s,
Newfoundland last week on a direct course to Prestwick, Scotland.
“It was a new aircraft and it performed flawlessly,”
said Gustafson, “but being out over an ocean for 10.6 hours,
most of it at night, is really stressful. You spend a lot of time
focused on the engine monitoring gages.” From Scotland, they
flew down to Ankara, Turkey. To avoid Iranian airspace, they
followed the south shore of the Black Sea, crossed the Caspian Sea
and went down through Turkmenistan into Afghanistan. Once they were
handed off to ATC in Afghanistan, they noticed the controllers
spoke perfect English. They were U.S. Air Force personnel, who
quickly informed them that Shindand was a “hot spot”,
subjected to frequent mortar attacks and gunfire. “That
brought on a whole new level of stress,” said Gustafson, who
admitted they had taken on the assignment with little idea of what
they were getting into. Fortunately, the three Skylanes were not
used for target practice.
Their arrival at Shindand coincided with ceremonies opening the
new training facilities. The airport is left over from the Soviet
occupation of Afghanistan. About a thousand people greeted the
three pilots and the Skylanes. After a number of speeches,
the three civilian pilots were flown to Kabul, where they boarded
flights to India, leaving the war zone behind them.
“The scenery we passed over was phenomenal,” said
Gustafson. “The contrast between Europe and Afghanistan was
very dramatic. It was like a time trip. The wastelands on the
eastern side of the Caspian Sea are amazingly stark and truly
fascinating to fly over.”
Gustafson turned down an offer to fly a new Caravan over the
same route. Total time for the Skylane delivery flight, which
started in Wichita, was 45.8 hours.