The mysterious Saldanha ghost

Hi there,

I don’t want to hijack the forum for things that may not have their place here but when I was a flying student in South Africa, I wrote a couple of “stories” [I love writing] about my training experience, rather on the funny side. So below you will find one of them, the morale of which could be of use to anyone.

However, if you think this is not relevant here, please tell me and I won’t post more of this kind… Maybe we all have countless equivalent tales after all.

This one relates my first long solo nav from Stellenbosch to Saldanha, with a touch and go in CapeTown International. Total flying time is approx 3hour + in a C152.

The mysterious Saldanha ghost
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I was not really happy this Sunday morning when I saw the clouds over Sir Lowry’s pass: my long solo navigation to WY/Worcester/Robertson/SP had already been cancelled twice due to poor conditions and it seemed that I could forget about it one more time. Of course, I had a back-up navigation to Saldanha but for “some” reasons, it didn’t appeal to me that much. Mostly because I hadn’t prepared it as thoroughly as the one to Worcester ; you know how it is, we all have our little favourite navigation that we know of by heart… Or maybe this is called being a chicken to go to a place where we haven’t been with our instructor !

As I realised later that was some real foolishness since the flight to Saldanha all along the coast is a first class beauty.

Anyway, I was a bit stressed and sulking when Gary [my instructor] signed the authorisation file : I felt that I was not really ready especially when the winds I had taken from the Met had changed since my call. “Don’t worry, you’ll be fine.”, Gary said. Happy to hear these words, I then headed to ZS-JYU with a subtle smile : if Gary said it was going to be fine, no need to stress…

And he was right ! The leg to Cape town was rather ok and, as I said the scenery on the way to Saldanha was breathtaking : the glittering sea on one side and the endless earth on the other, not a single cloud in the sky… Magnificent. Plus I had to admit that it was rather hard to get lost with such reference, hardly did I need to check my heading.

Eventually, I arrive overhead the lagoon, again outstanding view. Everything is fine, the harbour, Langebaan, my heading…. Come on boy we’re nearly there !

Radio call on 122.7, “Saldanha traffic, JYU a CESSNA 152 now overhead Langebaan at 2500 feet will be joining overhead the airfield at 2100 feet for landing in approximately 5 minutes.”

It is time to find the runway… I remember Gary’s words “you’ll see, it is a long, thin and tarred runway”.

I look below on my side, nothing. I check the map, the harbour, the heading, everything looks good, let’s keep going and we’ll get there. I look around, still nothing but the town, some fields and the sea. I start to feel this sort of itch behind the eye, you know this uneasy and uncomfortable feeling that you can’t get rid of when you start worrying. No reason to panic however. I keep looking around, still on my previous heading. Nothing…

And suddenly, Bliss !

This other soothing feeling that makes any pilot smile in these moments : a runway, on the left, a few miles away. Level turn and a moment later I was ready to call proudly 122.7 overhead. The runway is long, thin and tarred, who could ask for anything more ?

The fact that there was no windsock or that I couldn’t see it somehow didn’t bother me that much. Surprisingly enough, the absence of big figures at each end of the runway, supposedly 02/20 didn’t disturb me either : I’ll check out the sea that was hardly 500m away to get the wind.

Not a single hangar around, just a runway… With an ashamed feeling, I have to admit that I thought “Well, this is Africa after all, you weren’t expecting a tower or something, were you ?”.

So I called Saldanha overhead to join left downwind 20. The descent of the dead side was brilliant since it was actually over the sea which was a first for me. “Saldanha traffic, JYU, downwind, left base, final touch and go”.

Well, as for the touch, I nearly had to go around since just before touching I realised that there were some rocks near the runway threshold… I opened the throttle to get passed them, touched a bit roughly and off I went on with the rest of my navigation (Dwarskersbos, Piketberg, Malmesbury, an back toStellenbosch), leaving the very empty Saldanha airfield behind. Maybe it was a trick of the eyes but when I turned a last time to look at it, I think I saw a car on the runway… Hum, no, not possible.

I was happy to see the familiar Stellenbosch airfield and to close my flight plan after a pleasant and uneventful flight. Gary was right, it went well, there was no need to stress. I refuelled the plane, taxied it to the hangars and came back to the training centre, tired but happy. I told Gary about the flight and apart from a couple of minor hiccups it had been great.

However, I added sure of myself :
-But you know Gary, there’s nothing in Saldanha, not a hangar, not even a windsock, nothing !
-Are you kidding ? There are quite a few hangars, tower and all !
-… You’re joking, aren’t you ?

Well, it took a while before he convinced me he was not. Bl**dy hell, where did I land then ? I couldn’t believe it and I can assure you I felt really small at that moment.

Since then, I learnt a lot from this experience, starting with knowing where Saldanha was Not ! In fact, if you look on a 1:250000 map, 4 miles west of the Saldanha, you’ll see a little red line saying “landing strip”… That was the baby !

Two weeks ago, I came back there making up for my first adventure, this time landing on the “real” runway (I had a witness with me for those who still doubt). Indeed, there are a couple of hangars, a windsock and a proper labelled runway 02/20.

See, I wouldn’t blame you for laughing since it was rather stupid… All the missing features should have rung a bell. And I presume on some level they did. But I was so relieved to actually see a runway after some unsuccessful looking around that I just ignored them, as simply as that. So laugh, that’s all right but next time you fly to an unknown runway, please don’t forget to get well informed about what it looks like and don’t let your critical sense sleep just because you found “a” runway !

My last words go to the people in Saldanha (if there were any), hearing on the radio a guy calling overhead, downwind, base and final but not seeing any plane landing. Who knows, maybe I started a legend there : “the mysterious Saldanha ghost”…

Enjoy your flying!
The French man with a slight accent in some of the grammar