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     Returning to my original trip - we departed Hong Kong late in the evening of 21^st October 1987, and, just like the trading clipper ships and flying boats of yesteryear, we set course for Honolulu.  This flight would take 9:36 hours to complete, and mostly conducted at night.

     At the halfway mark in this flight, well out of range of either Tokyo or Honolulu ATC radar coverage, I was beginning to feel similar to one of Christopher Columbus’ crew members on the Santa Maria’s maiden voyage of discovery to the New World.  Had we in fact sailed off the edge of the flat earth?

     This is what spawned this feeling of drifting isolation, dear reader:

     Firstly: From my darkened cockpit, all I see outside is this endless black void.  We keep the cockpit lights cranked down low, in the hope we’ll spot any opposing air traffic as, due to lack of radar coverage, ATC is unable to advise us of any traffic.  All the same, what dimmed cockpit lighting we have makes it impossible to observe either stars or the ocean’s surface. 

     Secondly: We’re flying over hundreds of thousands of square, empty, black Pacific Ocean miles.  Approximately each half-hour we make position reports on scratchy, antiquated, WWII, HF Radios, based on the information fed by our three, Triple-Mixed, INSs to our PMS computer.  

World War 2, High Frequency (HF) Radio.

     But what if the computers are wrong?  No ATC Controller knows for certain where we actually are, for they have to rely solely on our radioed position reports...even if they’re wrong.  This is what led to the Korean Airlines 747 being shot down by the Russians back in 1983.  

B-747, 1st Sept. 1983, KAL 007 shot down in Soviet Airspace. 

     Comparable to the Columbus’ voyages, no one outside this air-vessel is aware of our exact location.

     Remember, dear reader, this is the “Stone Age” of airline flying – before the advent of GPS and satellite tracking for the civilian market. 

     But even with all this modern, whizz-bang, satellite tracking stuff, dear reader, it didn’t prevent Malaysian Airlines, Flight MH 370, to vanish in 2014.  Without even consulting my crystal ball, I predict they’ll never find this airliner.  I hope I’m wrong. 

B-777-200ER, 8th March 2014, MH 370 vanished.

 

     That’s the downside.  The upside is this magnificent, humongous, metal cocoon I’m flying in, with its four, gigantic, fan-jet engines, which are backed up by quadruple repetition on all important systems.  

     Plus I’m satisfied by the knowledge - learned in the flight simulator - that the 747 flies just as well on three engines as it does on four.  I therefore calmed myself.  Trusting the PMS computer hasn’t failed; it’s telling the truth regarding our actual position and is taking us where we want to go.  Heaving a huge sigh, I ordered another Perrier (wishing it was bourbon).

     How ludicrous is this, dear reader?  Placing one’s faith in a piece of electronic equipment - directing where a monstrous, metal machine should fly - while passing blindly through the darkness covering the vast Pacific.  As I’ve pointed out before, it helps to be slightly mentally unbalanced when pursuing the profession of a pilot.

     When we subsequently passed south of the Midway Atoll, hundreds of nautical miles off our left wing tip, the sky in front of us became the most beautiful shade of orange I had ever witnessed - a color that no artist could ever replicate.  It was announcing the stunning arrival of the sun.  And it reminded me - since we had previously crossed the International Date Line – that according to the calendar I was reliving yesterday.

     Wow!  How cool...so this is what’s it’s like to be a “Time Traveler.”

Since the crew and I were falling asleep, to wake us up, I took the captain’s

yacht wheel he was transporting to Honolulu for his boat and placed it on my lap.

Note the orange sky behind me.

     After the sun rose above the horizon, I also drank in the magnificent beauty of the endless Pacific.  The various shades of blues and greens, with startling-white cumulus clouds below, drifting above its surface, casting deep blue shadows.

     All those former concerns, spawned in the blackness of night, evaporated as if made of smoke, dear reader.  I ordered a cup of coffee on the intercom – brought to me by a beautiful, sleepy Singaporean girl - kicked back and enjoyed the “show.”

     By this time we had burned off adequate fuel, making us light enough, to reach 37,000 feet, where we cruised along at Mach 0.85 (85-percent of the speed of sound).  Upon checking the PMS computer, I found we were making good a groundspeed of 683 mph; being pushed along by a 26-knot tailwind.  Plus our ETA for Honolulu was on schedule.

     Incidentally, dear reader, whenever you’ve got your fat ass in a seat on the 747 – sipping champagne – keep in mind that as each hour ticks by your aircraft is getting, on average, lighter to the tune of 10,000 kilos (22,050 pounds).  This is the amount of fuel those four fanjet engines burn per hour; prompting your crew to request a higher level as the 747 gets lighter.  The higher you are, the thinner the air, which means less drag; requiring less fuel to maintain a constant cruise speed.  Honestly, it’s that simple.

     And, as we cruised along, there came a wide break in the broken cumulus cloud deck below, allowing me to accidentally spot a perfect, crescent-shaped atoll, possessing an immensely, beautiful, calm lagoon at its center.  Immediately I could appreciate that eons ago this had been a giant volcano jutting above the sea.  Sadly, at present, merely half of its coral-encrusted lip barely broke the ocean’s surface in a segmented crescent. 

     It reminded me that this is the condition of the majority of the Hawaiian Islands’ chain – they’re also sinking due to the sea’s erosion – and are creeping in a west by northwest direction.  Only the Big Island, with its active volcanoes, is fighting the Pacific for survival and in reality winning.

     However, there was something on this particular atoll that made me sit bolt-upright in my chair.  On the northern tip of its crescent – closest to me – there appeared to be a perfect, white, man-made rectangle!

     What the hell, dear reader?  Is that a runway?  With nothing around it!  This is nuts!

     Checking our position on the PMS, I then consulted my Jeppesen Instrument Enroute Chart.  Sure enough, I discovered a solitary blue circle encasing an atoll; the symbol for an uncontrolled airport.  Beside it was the name of this airfield: “French Frigate Shoals.”

     Who in their right mind would ever build an airport out here in all this empty isolation, dear reader?  When I arrived at Honolulu, the first order of business was to research French Frigate Shoals.  In so doing, I uncovered one of the strangest stories to come out of the Pacific:

     Two French frigates literally stumbled onto this atoll during the middle of a night in 1786; hence its name.

     Nonetheless, dear reader, I’m certain you’re familiar with that “date...in infamy,” the attack on Pearl Harbor, 7^th December 1941, by the Imperial Japanese Navy.  

     Except were you aware of the second attack on Pearl Harbor, in March of 1942, launched by the Japanese from French Frigate Shoals? 

     And here’s the really bizarre part: apparently the Japanese got the idea for this type of raid from a U.S. Navy Lieutenant.

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