World Tour Leg 13 - Monastir to Bani Walid (first try)

Well, finally a real challenge. I mean it... For few hours I thought I had to quit this adventure... But let's start by the beginning.

Monastir, in Tunisia, to Bani Walid, a remote location in Libya. 330 nm over a flat desert to land on a runway in the middle of nowhere that doesn't even have fuel supply. Why? To deliver 450 kg of industrial material, that was already loaded into my Baron. This means I have to be really careful with my fuel calculations. I cannot fill the tanks to the top, due to weight limits. So I load about 100 gallons and, in theory, I will spend about 50 in this trip. The remaining 50 gallons have to be enough to reach a nearby airport in which I can refuel.

The good point of this madness is that there is another cargo in Bani Walid to be delivered to El Beida, about 400 nm to the east. This means that I could earn about $7.000 in 2 long legs and a short one to refuel, crossing most of Libya as "side effect". Refuelling could be possible at Misrata Airport, which is at about 70 nm northeast of Bani Walid and on my way to El Beida.

By now, let's focus on the first leg, from Monastir to Bani Walid. And yes, it didn't end well.

My plan was to fly high. Higher than usual. It would be a slower trip but I would save plenty of fuel. The desert begins right at the south of Monastir, which means that there are less towns and more disperse. Few lakes and the coast help on the navigation, but in such a trip like this I decided to fly from VOR to VOR, being the first one in Sfax, a town at about 70 nm south of Monastir. My idea was to continue with VOR navigation along the coast, till Tripoli. Once there, depending on the fuel, I would decided to continue to my destination or to land.

The take-off was again really beautiful. That runway surrounded by salty water, really worthy to fly over. I flew over Monastir, a small coastal touristic town known by its Ribat, and Islamic castle from 769 AC that, not only is stunning but also has been one of the locations of Monty Python's Life of Brian movie.

Anyway, nice take-off and, suddenly, the desert. Well, I don't know if it's official "desert" yet, but it was just sand and the Mediterranean Sea.

As I planned, I started to climb. Prop at 2500 RPM and 25 in.Hg. on the manifold, going down as expected as I increased the altitude. Flying a bit to the east means odd numbers, so I aimed to 13500 ft. The climbing was good. Good CHT, EGT and oil temperature. Cowl flaps semi-open to keep all indicators in a confortable position. I didn't noticed anything weird. I reached 13500 ft.

Suddenly, the end of my trip. I was leaning ROP while, suddenly, both engines stopped. I don't think it was caused by the leaning. I was still at the rich side and I didn't even reach the peak. I saw myself starting a soft banking towards my left, to scan the ground in search of a landing spot. I was at 13000 ft., in the middle of nowhere. Sfax airport runway was at about 50 nm, and returning to Monastir was not a good idea due to the wind. Gliding at 100 kt, descending more than 1000 ft/min and strong winds... I couldn't see any way of reaching any decent landing spot.

I tried to switch on the engines while gliding, but it was impossible. The electric pumps didn't work at all, and all the indicators were down. I had electricity, since my avionics were still on, but no way of igniting the engines.

Few months ago I had an engine failure right after a take-off from Zeltweg, Austria (next to the F1 circuit). In that case I just lost most of the power but only in one engine that I shut off, being able to return to the runway with the other engine.

But now it was different. I descended in spiral, checking the ground and getting ready for a hard landing in some field of sand. And yes, it was hard...

Luckily I was alive and the Baron didn't look quite damaged. Just flat tires. I called to Monastir airport and they sent somebody with a crane, taking us (me and the aircraft) back to our departure.

Few hours later, the technician finished the maintenance and repairs. In addition to the tires, he only found damages in both left and right vacuum pumps. I paid him to substitute them by new units but, as you can guess, I don't think they were the cause of the failure. My guess is that they were damaged during the descent or landing, but I don't think they caused the failure of the engines and fuel pumps. If it was an electrical failure, this is difficult to spot.

Moreover, I totally forgot to take pictures. As you can imagine, I was quite busy trying not to die. But tomorrow, I'll try again this leg. Show must go on.

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Technical details:

DTTA - HLWD

BE SFAX-THYNA DJERBA ZAWIA ABU-ARGUB

Distance: 320 nm

- Engines failure at 13500 ft while climbing. Emergency landing on ground -

METAR:

DTMB 200000Z 13015KT 8000 NSC 20/14 Q1002

* The long straight vertical yellow line corresponds to the trip back to the airport from the ground, that was logged as part of the flight by IVAO. The landing was near the lake in the south.