First leg of today’s route complete. Safely touched town in Prestwick, Scotland for a short re-fuel before the longest leg of the trip – from Schotland to Iceland. This flight will mostly go over open waters. Beyond Scotland the Atlantic Route formally starts. The weather in Scotland is as grey and rainy as one would expect of a perfect summer and a good glimpse of the harsher conditions expecting us in Iceland and Greenland later.
Even though turbines are inherently reliable, we are still in a single engine aircraft and in the unlikely event of an engine failure, we would have to perform a water ditching in the Atlantic ocean. An aircraft can fly perfectly fine without engine, however it will constantly descent until it has to perform a forced landing. Water landings are usually survivable, especially when the sea is rather calm. However, the aircraft will eventually sink so you have to leave it immediately after the ditching through a special emergency hatch. In airliners those are typically over the wings in the “emergency exit rows” and that’s exactly how it is in our aircraft. Now the Atlantic Ocean is a bit colder than your typical Mallorca beach and the one reason that kills people ditching in the sea is the cold. Therefore, pilots carry so called “immersion suits” which allow you to survive until the rescue mission arrives. On top of that, aircraft are equipped with life rafts that you climb into once out of the aircraft. Flying at typical TBM altitudes, there is roughly 30 minutes time from the point of an engine failure until the ditching which seems plenty. However, one still has to control the aircraft, send a distress signal, plan the ditching and put on the extremely unhandy immersion suit. Therefore we thought it would be good practise to put it on up to the waist which not only looks good but also keeps the feet warm.
Speaking about warm feet, after touchdown in Reykjavik, we headed for the famous Blue Lagoon which has warm geysir water with silica gel, giving it a unique milky appearance. Very soothing and comfortable in surroundings that look like a different planet.
A great meal in a hidden cellar in downtown Reykjavik and a good night’s sleep with a view of our aircraft from the hotel room prepared us for second part of the Atlantic crossing.
