Flying India to Shanghai in a Learjet
Been flying and travelling a lot lately so here is a update on one of my trips!
We had a owner flight planned to go initially to Shanghai and Beijing, but unfortunately Beijing was dropped from the plan, so it was Kolkata – Hanoi (fuel stop) – Shanghai and opposite for return.
Flight times are Kolkata to Hanoi 2hr, Hanoi to Shanghai 3hrs, return posed some challenges for the aircraft and its endurance as the headwinds would top out at 167 kts! Plan return was Shanghai to Hanoi 3hr20min (turned out to be 3hr 47min) and Hanoi to Kolkata is 2hr 30min.
Here is the map of the trip:
Of course you can see this isnt the most direct route, and it means we fly through the airspace of 5 countries as opposed to 3 countries on the most direct route. But on looking the cost of a fuel stop in Kunming on the direct route was huge, the handlers cost $2000+ , the fees are high and the cost of jet fuel there is high, so looking elsewhere we found that stopping in Hanoi as the cheapest option, even though it is off track and adds 40 minutes to the total trip time.
To get through all these countries airspace you need overflight clearances. Now most countries you can get these yourself as the numbers are listed in the books and also on websites, but we chose to keep it simple and use the services of our handlers, they are:
Bangladesh overflight (and if ever you have to land here use these guys although its expensive to go to Bangladesh due to fees imposed to keep people from flying private aircraft to here) :
ZUNAYED ISLAM
MANAGER
AVIATION SUPPORT LTD
OFF – +8802-8815575 / 8817741
FAX – +8802-8817558
GSM – +880-1678010328
email; zunayed.asl@gmail.com
Vietnam (handles overflights also for Myanmar, Laos, Cambodia and Thailand)
T&T Aviation Department
(T&T Company Ltd)
Tel: +84.8.39256 331 Ext: 405
Fax: +84.8.39256 332
24hrs: +84.938 170 812
SITA: SGNTTUV AFTN: VVTSYUYX
Email: thanh.lh@tnt-vietnam.com
Website: www.tnt-vietnam.com
And China, we found these guys to be the best priced…
Jet Service China Success (JSC)
Operations ZBAA Ground Handling ZSPD Ground Handling
Tel: +8620 3618 0046 Tel/Fax: +8610 8448 6728 Tel/Fax: +8621 6610 8819
Fax: +8620 3618 0067 MB:+86 1350 1135 899 MB: +86 1381 7591 451
24 HR: +86 139 2213 9599 beijing@jscchina.com shanghai@jscchina.com
SITA：HKGJSXH
Now overflight clearances are easy to get, just hand over a wad of information about your aircraft and operation and within 3 days they will be issued. China overflight and landing is another story!
China needs you to be sponsored by a local company to take a private plane their, they also are quite restrictive about routes and altitudes, and of course the routes given are never what you want or need! China took just 1 day to get the permit but they advertise you should have the application in 7 days prior to flight.
The flight;
Leg 1 Kolkata to Hanoi
Lucky this isnt a fuel critical leg as we are kept typically low as we transit Bangladesh airspace. Bangladesh is the only country in the region without radar still, its also hard as on both sides its surrounded by India, and generally the phones lines between the atc centers are out of service so you must do the co-ordinating via radio to get higher altitudes and conflicting traffic, as Kolkata has the radar which subsequently shows all of Bangladesh on it! So as you fly across Bangladesk expect to be talking to Bangladesh ATC as well as Kolkata ATC…all at once.
Its also busy, as 6 minutes after take off you are entering another countries airspace. But funnily enough as soon as you leave India the radio communications get more standard, the quality of the controllers are better, the radio reception is better and the range is perfect so you can talk to atc at any point, unlike India!
Once you leave Bangladesh behind we go into Myanmar airspace and talk to Yangon. These guys are good, they will facilitate your climb by giving radar vectors and get you above the airline traffic and on your way. After Yangon we go into Vientiane, which is Laos. I should look up one day why its called Vientiane not Laos!. Here we are on the moving map over Laos
Descent and landing into Hanoi is uneventful, there are no clouds today, but a lot of haze and smoke, it seems the whole of Myanmar is on fire.
As we descend into the smoke and haze layer…
Here is Hanoi International airport;
Old russian planes lieing idle
The terminal at Hanoi
The yellow follw me car taking us to our spot
The stop in Hanoi is super efficient, they take me and passengers into the terminal by bus , while ranvir stays at the jet and gets the onwards clearance and setups the plane for departure whilst its refuelled. I go in and file the flight plan and go pee pee, while the passengers stretch their legs. 25 minutes engine stop to engine start is all it took, amazing!
Leg 2 Hanoi to Shanghai (Pudong airport)
Within 25 minutes of take off from Hanoi we are entering China’s airspace. Again we are kept low as there is a set altitude for crossing the border, I think it was 27 000ft , now of course 27 000ft sounds high but for a Learjet its not a happy place as to go fast here would chew through the fuel, so we slow ….
The next big drama is the conversion of feet to meters, and for 10300 m they say 10 thousand 3 hundred meters when they give you a level… so we have this chart help us out as like most all the planes in the world, we are calibrated in feet not meters so a conversion table is a must.
Conversion chart feet to meters
As we go further into China some storms appear near Nanchang, but thats ok we will miss them.
For some reason unknown to me in China they don’t like you flying directly along the airways, instead they make you fly 3 nm offset to the right, so you fly parallel to the airway. Strange! Lucky the planes computer can do this for us, otherwise it would make for a long day!
About half way into the trip we are given the final climb to altitude!
Then is starts into Shanghai…its annoying though as the route we have to fly takes us north of Shanghai and then we turn back to the south… what a waste of fuel!
I am sitting there with my new stick on by static electricity sun shades that I bought in Walmart the week before and realize the irony, they have made in china on them!
We descent into the bumpy air and clouds of Shanghai, unfortunately it got too busy and dark to take any more pics…
Shanghai airport is big , we thought it was going to be hard to find our way around, but no it wasnt…
Pudong airport
We easily found parking spot number 509!
We land and our ever efficient handlers, take our passport, the passengers and their luggage and get them out and on their way, we then get our passports returned to us, and after cleaning up the plane and putting it to bed for the 3 day rest it will have we we are taken out of the airport, no customs no immigration nothing, its all predone and cleared and we have a stamp in our passport.
Just now its a 1 hr drive into the city to our hotel!
Here is the hotel and view from my rooom I see when we arrive….
More on this adventure shortly….
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