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Photos by tour ....
Tour 1 Tour 2 Tour 3 Tour 4 Tour 5 Tour 6 Tour 7 Tour 8
Tour 3 started with some excitement ....see Post Wed29Apr15 |
Cruising the Freeway at 11500 ft 3500 m hoping for a clear patch at the destination ( there was not ....so RTB ) |
Outbound - low in a cloudy Freeway |
Due entirely to the corrupt practices of those near and far, Asian One Air was grounded for a month waiting on spare parts and DGCA (Civil Aviation Authority) paperwork. This was very frustrating for our team in Nabire and we escaped for a day to the waterfalls along the Kali Legari and its tributary Kali Negari. |
Fish farm along Makini Road GoogleMaps Parking downstream beside the deteriorating bridge and weir over the Legari. In 2025 it looks like a wider road and new bridge have been built GoogleMaps |
The last two kilometers to the pool on the Kali Negari ....starting with a walk through the Legari ( some shaky frames from the camcorder ) ![]() |
Up a hill beside the rockface over which, had it not been for a long dry spell,
the Kali Negari would have poured
....and along a jungle path Cocytia durvillii moth in the jungle above the Kali Legari, Papua |
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....reaching the lower [shallow] pool with a small waterfall in the middle of the jungle on the Kali Negari ....and lunch with the insect chorus ! |
The upper [deeper ] pool where the air temperature is a comfortable 27°C
but the Negari comes straight off a 10000 ft 3000 m mountain so the water feels ice cold
Starting back towards Nabire along the jungle path by the Kali Negari |
A very tropical scene captured from far away ....Asian One Air C208B Caravan PK-LTF landing in Nabire |
Dog on the runway at Nabire - she needed a blast of reverse thrust just to get her moving |
Full movie on YouTube
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A few camcorder frames from the end of the runway in Nabire, starting with a normal scene at the close of the school day ( at least these ones kept an eye on the approaching aircraft ) |
We all understand you are tired at the end of the school day
but an active runway is not the place to rest !
....and we are phoning your Mother !!!
We often carry fighting cocks to/from matches. Some of these birds are worth more than the rest of the cargo combined. Our Ground Crew, not knowing the English words, called it a 'Battle Chicken'. This one flew with us so regularly I dubbed it BattleChicken Galactica |
Working our way around Bilorai in bad weather |
Landing at Bilorai in the rain Crew day out to the Pantai Pasir Putih ( White Sands Beach )
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Pantai Pasir Putih - white sands in a mangrove
Pantai Pasir Putih - tree in a tree Herding tiny pufferfish on to the sand |
Our Engineer Marsel trapping pufferfish in the surf We are not amused.... |
Our Avionics Engineer Jefri at his best |
GoPro frame from the tailcone - smoking it into Ilaga. For the purists : Touchdown was on the threshold at Maximum Landing Weight with a 13 knot tailwind at Density Altitude 11500 ft 3500 m followed by a graceful 80 m bounce. Because of slope and/or terrain, most airstrips in Papua are one-way (landing in one direction and taking off in the opposite direction) so you always end up doing something in a tailwind GoPro movie frame - departing Ilaga |
AscoNusa C208A without Cargo Pod in the Freeway |
AscoNusa C208A westbound in the Freeway at 10500 ft 3200 m |
We stayed together all the way to Nabire where, with Air Traffic Control's kind permission,
we followed PK-FLM into the circuit
How to see the top of your wings without a ladder....
Counting fuel filler caps - ours were all still there See post Wed29Apr15 |
GoPro movie frame - departing Bilorai RWY27. We are heavy so accelerating low over the runway and banking left to follow the slope ahead That departure filmed by Ramli, our man in Bilogai |
GoPro movie frame - on another day departing Bilorai RWY09
into a headwind with a very light load so we can climb steeply
PTMQ Amano traditional gold mine along the Kali Derewo
Thru neglect, most of the river mining airstrips have become unusable for fixed wing aircraft.
Instead they are serviced by the rotaries
( which also does not always end well - in this case 1 fatality and 6 injured )
Starting another day at 0500L and 28°C, our Engineer Meli captured the dawn |
0600L and 30°C ....departing on the day's 1st mission into the Highlands |
Insect removal - harking back to my first job in aviation ....cleaning aircraft in Canberra, Australia in 1985. Not so simple in Papua in 2015 when the water evaporates out of the soapsuds before you get the chance to wipe |
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- END OF TOUR 4 |