Anyway, I decided to cut the Earth's globe in half by slicing it through those two magnetic poles and the earth's centre...Well you can do that in 360 differing ways assuming the cuts are one degree apart. However, only one of those cuts passes through McLeland Field and that is the cut I chose.
Now I have a Great Circle cut and with my B757 Freighter in mind I looked at suitable sectors, and the cut passes through or very close to McLeland Field, Exeter, DAUG (unpronouncable place in Algeria), Capetown, McMurdo Station (Antarctica), Invercargill (NZ) and Johnson Atoll (Pacific Ocean). So a rather different circumnavigation emerges with only seven sectors:-
PAMA-EGTE 3844 nm
EGTE-DAUG 1146 nm
DAUG-FACT 4068 nm
FACT-NZWD 3991 nm
NZWD-NZNV 1888 nm
NZNV-PJON 3974 nm
PJON-PAMA 2889 nm
TOTAL 21820 nm
Dreaming up some excuse for such a trip is a bit of a challenge but some madman has to charter me to take a full load of freight (18.2 tonnes) from my base here in Alaska to Capetown. Then on with no freight via the ice of McMurdo Station to Invercargill in NZ, to grab another full load and bring it on round, across the Pacific and back to my base. It is hard to imagine 18 tonnes of just what? would be attractive from Alaska to the people of South Africa but I guess that 18 tonnes of frozen New Zealand lamb might go down well in Alaska!
Well planning that has been fun and the seven Flightplans are made. As to when I get time to fly over all that boring default scenery...Well it will have to be done when HWMBO is away playing with her boat
