Kings Experience the Freedom of Around-The-World General Aviation Flying

"We now personally know the world really is round," says John King upon returning from his and Martha's around-the-world flight which included flying the entire breadth of Russia.

"We learned a lot about IFR flying in the rest of the world," added Martha. "The 14,000-mile flight was close to flawless, but in Russia the cockpit workload quickly grew challenging while flying IFR with altitudes in meters above the airport instead of feet above sea level, altimeter settings in hectoPascals, and wind speed in meters per second. Throw in foreign controllers, large distances, marginal weather, 'interesting' approach plates and a flying environment where every airport and every runway was new and you could get pretty busy."

John King observed, "Martha and I marvel at the ability to fly our own airplane through Russia un-chaperoned. For those of us who remember crawling under our school desks to practice air raid drills it is amazing that we flew our own airplane to Moscow and sat with a drink in hand on the historic Red Square that was home to Mayday parades and the bizarre landing field for Mathias Rust's Skyhawk. Although we never entertained serious thoughts of landing our Falcon 10 on Red Square, the whole Russian experience made us feel there really is hope for the growth of general aviation throughout the world."

The 13-day flight began and ended at Montgomery Field in San Diego and included stops at Regina, Churchill, and Iqaluit in Canada; Reykjavik, Iceland; Bergen, Norway; Moscow, Yekaterinburg, Novosibirsk, Khabarovsk, Magadan, and Anadyr in Russia; Anchorage (AK) and Everett (WA).

The Kings plan on sharing their experience in articles and talks on the subject of IFR Around The World.

FMI: www.kingschools.com