Cream Color Indian Chief Western 737-200 Working In Alaska

[aharon]

Shalom and greetings all my pals,

Presenting a nice Western airline flight abroad 737-200 with cream color Indian chief Western livery from PADQ Kodiak Benny Benson State Airport located four nautical miles southwest of the central business district of Kodiak on Kodiak Island in Alaska to PANC Ted Stevens Anchorage International Airport located 5 miles southwest of downtown Anchorage.

Boarding the plane



Closing rear passenger door and retracting front passenger door stair



Time to turn all required lights and to start engines!!



Since PADQ does not have pushback tugs, the plane is making tight u-turn toward taxiway



Taxiing to short of runway 07



Holding short of runway 07 for take off clearance



Take off clearance is granted and entering into runway 07 for more taxi and backtracking



Now backtracking at beginning of runway 07



Starting take off run!!



Airborne on climb to 21,000 ft to start the route INNOL HOM ENA GASTO TYONE ICICL BOB



Nice wing view of climbing through clouds



Still climbing through clouds



Making heading adjustment during the climb to Fl210



Dig those AMAZING clouds



Engines roaring through clouds



More climb climb through clouds



Almost reaching Fl210



Nice tail view



Now cruising at Fl210 with background view of Gulf of Alaska





Clouds have been cleared with few remaining puffs of clouds



Wing view of approaching coastline of Kachemak Bay State Park



Entering waters of Cook Inlet



When you see the plane making right turn, you know it is time to make final runway approach to runway 07R



At 3,000 ft with wing view of sunset and waters of Cook Inlet



Nice tail view of sunset



Sorry cannot resist wing view of sunset shining its light over waters of Cook Inlet



ARRGGGGGG the wings are too strong making it difficult to make straight runway approach Argggghh crosswinds



Dealing with darn crosswinds



Fighting against winds



ARGGHHHHH making adjustments against wind direction



Much better and centerline!!



Seconds before touchdown



TOUCHDOWN



Engaging reverse thrusters on super shiny engines!



Braking down on icy runway



Exiting into taxiway G which is favorite taxiway to exit from runway 07R



Finish crossing runway 07left via taxiway G to taxi to gate



Still taxiing



Approaching gate 8 while snow plow truck is hurrying to get out of way



Approaching gate 8



Arrived at gate with jetway connecting to the plane



Thank you for viewing my flight report and please stay tuned for next exciting flight

Regards,

Aharon

[Tom/CalClassic]

Flew in plenty of those Sacto - LAX back and forth to college. First class legroom and free champagne. Ahh, that's the life...

[aharon]

Mar 24, 2020 14:10:26 GMT -5 Tom/CalClassic said:

Flew in plenty of those Sacto - LAX back and forth to college. First class legroom and free champagne. Ahh, that's the life...

Which airline and which college town or airport in college town??  Maybe I can try to recreate flight???

Regards,

Aharon

[dave mcqueen]

Mar 24, 2020 14:10:26 GMT -5 Tom/CalClassic said:

Flew in plenty of those Sacto - LAX back and forth to college. First class legroom and free champagne. Ahh, that's the life...

So you were over 21 ?

[Pacific SMX]

Hi Aharon,

I'm pretty sure Tom was referring to SMF, Sacramento International. I seem to recall that Pacific Airlines was also fairly active there up to it's 1968 merger into Airwest.

Regards,
Phil

[Tom/CalClassic]

Hi,

I went to UCLA in 1971-1973, just before Western went to the big W scheme (as I remember). I was 20 and 21 back then, and they never asked me for ID, as I remember. In 1973 I went on to grad school at UCLA and continued flying Western, albeit usually with a big W 737.

My home base was indeed Sacramento Metropolitan Field, SMF, which opened in 1967. But when I was growing up we would go to the old Sacramento Muni (now Executive) on Sunday afternoons, and watch the propliners pass through. Just before SMF opened we would watch the Western 720Bs just making it off the short runways at KSAC!

[dave mcqueen]

Mar 25, 2020 10:28:01 GMT -5 Tom/CalClassic said:

............  we would watch the Western 720Bs just making it off the short runways at KSAC!

unlike the F86 disaster 5 years later into Farrell's Ice Cream Parlor.

---

In 1972 I was a journeyman at ZOA in Area C. We worked Oakland Oceanic - manual control positions plus 4 radar sectors - TAC, Mount-Hamilton, Woodside and OCR. TAC (Terminal Area Control) was a low altitude arrival sector into SFO and OAK- FL230 and below; Mount Ham was a complicated sector, also low altitude that covered southeast of San Jose to Panoche. Woodside worked Bay arrivals from over Big Sur. OCR -  surface to unlimited - worked incoming and outgoing traffic to Hawaii from Travis and the Bay Area out to about 250 miles offshore.  In the mid-80s Area C was merged into 4 other areas and I elected to work jet traffic eastbound from the Bay and vice versa plus departing and arriving traffic to McClellan Rapcon from Southern California. You may recall me passing you a message one time when you flew up to SMF from SAN.

[Tom/CalClassic]

Hi,

Oh yes, I remember your message. All the passengers were duly impressed that I got a shout out from the cockpit crew.

The Farrell's disaster was very personal to my family - the brother of my sister's best friend committed suicide after being badly burned in the accident.

[aharon]

Thanks all for kind words and for interesting explanations

Regards,

Aharon