46:24.4N 006:15.5E
The
flight westward to California
In the early
morning of the 9th of August 2004, we loaded
up everything and took off from my
home airfield Prangins ,
a small 1,500-foot grass
strip, close
to Geneva,
Switzerland.
First Officer Olivier Reymond
After clearing Swiss and French customs at Geneva
International, we then headed
first in fair
weather, later in heavy
rain across
western France toward our
first fuel
stop at Jersey Island in the English Channel.
Fuel stop at Jersey
While visiting the
weather office, we
learned that the meteorological condition over England and Scotland were anything
but favourable, with an almost
stationary cold front from the southern tip of England into the far northern
part of central Scotland.
At that moment, we had
some doubts whether we could reach Stornoway in the Isle of Lewis
on the northerly tip of
Scotland
that day.
After takeoff from
Jersey, and about two hours into
our flight, it became obvious
from the rapidly deteriorating meteorological
conditions and from listening
to the air traffic conversations, that the north-western part of
Scotland was
experiencing heavy,
stormy weather. In
the area of Manchester and on the airway, I decided to divert across
the front to Wick, on the
eastern tip
of northern
Scotland.
After our departure. The coast line of Jersey
With no visibility and heavy rain, we continued across the country up to Aberdeen in eastern
Scotland, where all of a
sudden
we broke out of clouds
and continued on to our first
day's destination - Wick.
The place we stayed for the first night at Wick
Preparation of our Immersion suits for the crossings of the ice cold Atlantic in the next days