Being at Fujairah meant that we now had a shorter journey to get to Pakistan. It seemed clear that whatever we did the Iranians were not going to give us clearance, so we gave up on them. The alternative was to make directly for Gwadar, just inside Pakistan, a stage of 350 miles or so, every single mile of it of it over sea. We reckoned that was just about ok, as experience was showing that 350 miles was within range. The sea route was anyway very close to land, even if it was Iranian land. The engine was running well enough for us to feel we could rely on it.
We had clearance into Pakistan, though when James phoned ahead to confirm the pre-arranged Avgas supply at Gwadar he found that the military had raised a query about the flight. What this query was they wouldn’t say. What James was hearing did not amount to refusal, or to a withdrawal of the clearance. We could always apologise later if there was a problem, we decided.
We spent some time in the pleasant atmosphere of the Fujaira tower offices, searching for the best weather information. A lot of it in that part of the world is based on Dubai, 300 miles to the east. By special request we were able to get information for our route and at a low level, and it showed a 15 knot wind from the north west, which was not far off a tail wind for our intended course going more or less due east. So it looked good: an unfavourable wind could have taken our destination Gwadar out of range. We just had to hope that the forecast was right.
It looked as if it would be a mistake to take the military query about the flight too seriously, so we filed a flight plan by fax, and we got a fax back accepting it.
We had refuelled the previous day, and all we had to do now was leave.
The Hotel Plaza had been welcoming and entertaining, with the Manager dining with us, and enjoying with us (in an otherwise empty hotel restaurant) a charismatic performance by an Abba tribute band. The airport staff had been kind to us and helpful; they had charged us no landing fees, and we had received warm hospitality and gifts. And we had met Captain Khaled, a private pilot who owned an air-conditioned four-seat Cessna, who gave us two litres of precious oil of just the right type.
“Heading east over the sea? Make sure your fuel filters are in good shape,” he warned, clearly not wanting to elaborate.
It seemed to me to be a peculiarly specific warning, and I wondered what he meant exactly. I did as he said, and gave the fuel system a very careful pre-flight check.
The engine started without a problem. We sent our warm thanks over the airfield radio, and flew out over the sea. The day before, we had approached Fujaira from the landward side, so we hadn’t appreciated the full splendour of the sea-port. We could now see the extent of the harbour, crowded with around 30 ships. Someone had told us that Fujaira is a good international shipping destination, because the insurance is less than if you go into Dubai or points beyond. Any farther west than Fujaira involves going closer to Iran as you pass through the Straits of Hormuz, and there is also a greater danger of uncharted magnetic mines, which make a mess of your ship. The sight of all those ships at anchor was impressive.
We set course, due East, for Pakistan. Soon we were out of radio range of Fujaira, and were alone in the hazy blue sky. Below us the sea was mirror calm, above us the sky was a blur of salty haze, and ten miles to our left was an unbroken red Iranian cliff. With no features to measure our progress by, the visual monotony created an illusion of hanging stationary in the sky. The only thing that seemed to be moving was the fuel gauge. Occasionally a coastal freighter would appear below us, and we would be jolted into an appreciation of our speed, like stepping onto an unseen escalator.
At our half way point, we called up the coastal military airbase half way along the coast, who did not answer. We headed out to sea in deference to their airspace, and described a 30 mile radial arc around them until back within sight of the cliffs on the far side.
As far as we could tell, no-one knew we were there.
We flew on, listening unconsciously to the monotony.
After another ten minutes, and well past our half-way point, we found ourselves looking at each other. Nothing you could put your finger on, but we had both noticed something. Something that our survival instincts had alerted us to. Listening hard for a few minutes revealed nothing, and as we flew on, our eyes wandered over the instruments, looking for clues as to what had spooked us.
Just as we were both relaxing, the engine gave a cough that neither of us could ignore. All the dials showed normal, so it was likely to be fuel. Dirty fuel. Not good, off the coast of Iran, out of radio range of anywhere, too far from friendly Fujaira to turn back, a day’s walk from a military base who hadn’t answered us, and with no shipping in sight.
The cough became a feature of the engine’s rhythm, and the rotor speed decayed slightly as the engine’s power output reduced.
Martin turned left gently, heading for the coast. “Let’s go and clean those filters,” he whispered, as if trying to avoid alarming anyone.
“Better get low in case there’s radar,” I suggested, in a similar whisper. Although this would reduce our gliding distance if the engine quit completely, it might make our two-man invasion of Iranian territory less immediately noticeable.
Five minutes later, we landed in the swirling red dust on the clifftop. A straight military road stretched off into the desert haze in both directions, and the desert shimmered. A sea breeze climbed lazily up the cliff.
As I opened my door the heat was like an industrial process.
With the rotors slowing , we got out and had a look. On each side of the machine there are drainage points for the pilot to check the fuel system for contamination before each flight. We checked all of these, and there was some water in these traps, and a really serious amount of grit. There was nothing for it; we were going to have to get the tools out and check the main fuel filters. Looking anxiously up and down the road for any approaching vehicle, we started unpacking.
As we had not expected to use our tools, and as they were heavy, we had packed them underneath absolutely everything else. On the side of a lonely Iranian road, 50 yards from the clifftop, I unpacked the helicopter item by item, until I found the screwdriver to take the panels off. I unscrewed each panel in turn, handing Martin the precious screws one by one.
“Keep an eye on the road,” I suggested.
Martin piled up the panels carefully, putting them on a pile of maps so they weren’t damaged, and putting the sat-phone on top of them to stop them blowing away in the wind.
Finally I could see the fuel filter. I unscrewed the blue anodised trap bowl, using a mole wrench, having first untied the stainless steel wire which was there to stop it coming undone in flight. I handed it to Martin to clean, while I held my thumb over the end of the pipe to stop the fuel pouring out.
“Turn the fuel off, would you?” I asked him. I had my thumb over the end of the pipe to stop it pouring out.
The trap bowl was full of some kind of smooth grit, which had clogged the gauze. It was amazing that the engine had run at all. Martin cleaned it as well as he could using my toothbrush.
He handed the bowl back to me.
“Hurry up!” he urged.
“OK, OK,” I said. I blew into it one last time.
With the traps back together, the wire threaded back around them, the panels on, we were just starting to repack the helicopter, when distant movement caught my eye. It was a tiny bolus of white dust, shimmering at the edge of visual range on the road in the direction of the military base we’d flown past an hour ago. Probably a truck, and heading our way.
“Time to go,” I said, pointing over Martin’s shoulder. “Get in and start up, while I look round.”
I threw the rest of our stuff onto the back seats, climbed in, and tried to start the engine. It turned over, but didn’t fire.
“The fuel lines must be full of air!” yelled Martin, above the grinding noise of the starter, as I checked around the instruments for obvious problems. He got out, and ran round trying to drain some fuel through from the draining points. None came.
I looked around the cockpit for what might be wrong. Suddenly I remembered that the fuel master switch was off. It’s a switch you never usually use as a pilot, except if there’s a fire in flight, so it doesn’t usually to mind in the engine start procedure. Especially when you’ve got a truck full of Iranian militia bouncing along a dusty desert road towards you. I turned it back on.
Ten seconds later then engine was running and warming up. This normally took about 5 minutes to complete, including various engine checks you were supposed to do.
I could almost see detail on the approaching truck. Martin ran round Uniform Kilo one last time to check we hadn’t left anything undone or hanging off. Satisfied, he climbed in and strapped himself in.
“Today would be good,” he said sharply.
Against all my pilot instincts, before the engine was warm and tested, I engaged the clutch which engages the rotors. They remained still, sullenly, for a second or two, then started their lumbering turning.
Before we could fly away, the rotor clutch had to be completely engaged, and then the engine and rotors had to be wound up to full revs. Anything less than that, and you were gambling at the edge of the physics.
Martin said nothing, but looked out at the approaching truck. By now we could now see there were two of them, with canvas covers flapping.
“Hang on to something,” I shouted into my headset microphone.
Martin said nothing, checked that both our straps were tight and secure, and grabbed the doorframe to steady himself.
I could tell that Uniform Kilo was critically unready for flight, but we couldn’t wait.
I put on power to take off into the hover, just as the clutch was finishing its work. The rotors still weren’t turning quite fast enough. For a few moments the stall warning horn screamed at us, and the yellow light came on, dim in the blinding desert sunshine. But Uniform Kilo rose uncertainly in a cloud of red dust, hiding our detailed outline from the approaching trucks. The effort of lifting us slowed the already slow rotors, and for a moment I thought physics might defeat me.
Stamping on the left pedal to bring the long tail away from the cliff edge and out to sea, I flung Uniform Kilo sideways over the cliff, and lowered the lever very sharply to put the unsteady helicopter into a fast spiralling decent, still with left pedal on. The upward rush of air through the rotors in the glide helped the engine get them up to the right speed for the first time since we had taken off. We were flying, but we were dropping nose first towards the sea, with the cliff only 10 feet from the tips of our rotors.
As the surf at the bottom of the cliff rushed up towards us, I pulled us out of the dive, as hard as I dared, Uniform Kilo shuddering with the effort. We levelled out a few feet above the tops of the waves, with the smell of the sea filling the cockpit as our downwash drove spray against the perspex.
“Head off that way close to the cliff,” Martin said, pointing towards distant Pakistan. “It looks like it curves around out of sight in about half a mile.
Martin looked back through his side window as we hugged the cliff. “The trucks have stopped at our landing site,” he said.
We flew on in silence, reflecting on our narrow escape, and listening for any more trouble from the engine.
In the last half hour we were fascinated by the moonscape nature of the coast below us as we moved in from over the sea, which we did after passing the Iran/Pakistan border still at very low level. The massive rocky cliffs plunged straight down into the sea, now fronting a range of mountain peaks of much the same height, all of it riven with valleys that led nowhere. And it was all a dark red-brown. This unusual rock formation began to transform into a more familiar sandy orange scrubland as we approached the desert airfield at Gwadar.
