Leg 225, Chickaloon, Matanuska-Susitna to Utqiagvik, North Slope, Alaska
DAY04_04.PLN (16.7 KB)
Another marathon leg through an epic storm. I didn’t check the weather forecast beforehand (never do, let it be a surprise) and found myself in a snow storm with high winds. Checking the weather later indeed had a winter storm alert up. It provided plenty landing challenges and finally getting out the storm on the other side was amazing.
04-03 King Ranch AK59 1:24 PM
04-03 Sheep Mountain PASP 1:34 PM
04-03 Tahneta PASS HNE 1:39 PM
04-03 Snowshoe Lake Airport and Seaplane Base 5AK4 1:48 PM Trees in the way and traffic jam on the ‘runway’
04-03 Tazlina Z14 1:53 PM
04-03 Gulkana PAGK 2:05 PM
04-03 Jacobus 8AK1 2:10 PM
04-03 Chistochina CZO 2:24 PM
04-03 Deltana Airport PADB 2:28 PM
04-03 Duffys Tavern DDT 2:37 PM
04-03 Devils Mountain Lodge IBN 2:52 PM
04-03 Beaver Creek CYXQ 3:16 PM
04-03 Tony Beets Airstrip 63°37’14.6"N 138°48’10.9"W 3:56 PM Scribner Creek 63°37’07.0"N, 138°42’29.0"W
04-03 Dawson CYDA 4:16 PM
04-03 Dawson City Airport CYDT 4:38 PM Not near Dawson City
04-03 Coal Creek L20 5:08 PM 34 knot headwind snowstorm
04-03 Chena Hot Springs AK13 5:41 PM
04-03 Ladd Aaf PAFB 6:01 PM
04-03 Fairbanks Intl PAFA 6:07 PM 30 knot headwind
04-03 Manley Hot Springs PAML 6:38 PM
04-03 Healy PAHE 6:45 PM Trees at end of runway
04-03 American Creek 80A 6:57 PM Papua New Guinea style landing
04-03 Calhoun Meml PATA 7:13 PM
04-03 Edward G Pitka Sr PAGA 8:03 PM
04-03 Nulato PANU 8:14 PM 20 knot headwind
04-03 Haycock HAY 8:45 PM
04-03 Elim PFEL 9:04 PM 5 knot headwind, storm finally dying down, still no viz
04-03 Golovin PAGL 9:13 PM
04-03 Golovin GLV 9:16 PM
04-03 White Mountain PAWM 9:25 PM
04-03 Solomon State Field AK26 9:36 PM
04-03 Nome City 94Z 9:47 PM
04-03 Nome PAOM 9:54 PM
04-03 Feather River 3Z1 10:09 PM
04-03 Teller PATE 10:21 PM
04-03 Port Clarence CGS PAPC 10:28 PM
04-03 Wales PAIW 10:42 PM
04-03 Shishmaref PASH 11:06 PM
04-03 Deering PADE 11:35 PM 20 knot tailwind at 6,000ft but still no visibility
04-03 Buckland PABL 11:54 PM
04-04 Selawik PASK 12:12 AM
04-04 Roland Norton Memorial Airstrip 8AK3 12:18 AM
04-04 Bob Baker Mamorial PAIK 12:29 AM
04-04 Icy Cape AFS 2AK8 1:40 AM
04-04 Wainwright PAWI 1:58 AM
04-04 Wainwright AS PAWT 2:01 AM
04-04 Atqasuk Edward Burnell Sr Memorial PATQ 2:19 AM
04-04 Wiley Post-Will Rogers Memoria PABR 2:40 AM
Flight time 13:16 47 stops
Departure from King Ranch early morning
Following the Matanuska river for a bit
Sheep mountain airport, no sheep
Along Glenn Highway near Woods Creek
Smokey Lake
Gulkana Airport, a little break from the snow
Following the Copper River
To Christochina, population 93
Deltana Airport along Glenn Highway Tok Cutoff across Sinona Creek
Caribou Creek, the storm is coming
Along Skookum Volcano Trail
Devils Mountain Lodge
Nice place but better batten down the hatches
Flying parallel to Stuver Creek
Beaver Creek Airport
White River
Arriving at Tony Beets’ place, Eureka Creek Mine, Gold Rush legend
Unfortunately no Bing map data here
Landed on Tony Beets’ airstrip anyway, at least where it is supposed to be
Parker actually dug it up last season to mine more gold, but still there on Google maps
Scribner Creek, Parker Schnabel’s mine site
Bing has some data in this spot but hard to see with the snow cover
Here is John Schnabel (1920-2016) arriving at the airstrip, Parker’s grandpa, great guy
The Klondike river with all the tailings left behing by gold mining river dredges
Dawspon city where the Klondike river flows into the Yukon river, the epicenter of the Klondike gold rush
SS Keno National Historic Site on the right
The Klondike gold rush drew an estimated 100,000 prospectors to the Klondike region between 1896-1899. Many did not make it. Dawson city grew to a population of about 30,000 by 1898, from just 500 prior. Nowadays there are 1,375 people left in Dawson city
Yukon-Charley Rivers National Preserve
The Yukon river spans 3,195km from northwest BC, Canada to Norton Sound, AK into the Bering Sea
Ladd Army Airfield at Fort Jonathan Wainwright, no more escaping the storm
Fairbanks, the largest city in the Interior region of Alaska
Fairbanks International Airport
Golden Heart Plaza on the right
Also here the Pioneer Air Museum
In the thick of it on the way to Manley Hot Springs, sounds good
Manley Hot Springs, population 89
American Creek Airport, perfect landing conditions
Not so bad sheltered between the trees
Of course the pilots couldn’t see a thing, totally iced in…
Turn around and off we go again, flying blind
An hour later, some visibility returns. Edward G Pitka Sr Airport on the Yukon River
Elim, population 330
Golovin, population 156
Nome City Airport
Nome Alaska, modern gold rush town
You can also find the White Alice Towers here
The White Alice Communications System used tropospheric scatter antennas for long distance communications before satellites took over.
Nome Harbor
Nome Airport with on the lower left, gold dredges on the beach
The Reaper is visible on the left (at the location in the shot above)
And the Christine Rose on the right
From Bering Sea Gold, gold dredging in summer under the ice in winter
Teller, population 229
Crossing the King River
https://i.imgur.com/9duhA8n.png
Wales, population 145
https://i.imgur.com/QLyiWTV.png
Miltletukeruk
https://i.imgur.com/HfULVQz.png
Deering Airport, double socked, population 122
https://i.imgur.com/TkqknZU.png
Buckland, population 416, on the Buckland river
https://i.imgur.com/bynXjHq.png
Selawik in Northwest Arctic Borough, population 829, a metropolis out here!
https://i.imgur.com/nLt49f2.png
Roland Norton Memorial Airstrip
https://i.imgur.com/IZcJwHS.png
Bob Baker Memorial Airport in Kiana on the Kobuk River
https://i.imgur.com/a9VyoId.png
Population 361
https://i.imgur.com/Fcro8dI.png
Kobuk Valley National Park, break in the clouds spotted!
https://i.imgur.com/xMuhvHp.png
Couple more clouds to punch through
https://i.imgur.com/mByHwsO.png
And there it is, the sky
https://i.imgur.com/Eqmj8QG.png
Feels great to be out in the sun again after a day stuck in a storm, on to Icy Cape
https://i.imgur.com/OyvIFj8.png
https://i.imgur.com/Yrwa4Qz.png
https://i.imgur.com/3PRrLdO.png
Icy Cape, 70 degrees North
https://i.imgur.com/poDy0vA.png
Sunset on the way to Wainwright
https://i.imgur.com/wxg0kYu.png
Wainwright, population 556
https://i.imgur.com/WNJ3Qkq.png
https://i.imgur.com/RO8YGHi.png
Last glimpse of the sun
https://i.imgur.com/S3WAIGI.png
Atqasuk, population 228
https://i.imgur.com/DG99iOc.png
Wiley Post-Will Rogers Memorial Airport last stop for the day
https://i.imgur.com/BCYuj1M.png
At Utqiaġvik, formerly known as Barrow, the largest city of the North Slope Borough (pop 4,383)
https://i.imgur.com/m65e7mI.png
Further North tomorrow, as far as I can go!
(The North Pole is out, unfortunately the world ends at 85 degrees North and South in MSFS)