Loooong GA flight in progress

flightaware.com/live/flight/N9484B

17 hours in the system a mighty long haul!

Equipment suffix perplexes me, why slant C?

Allen

flightaware.com/about/faq_aircra … suffix.rvt

But WHY /C? I dunno.
Altitude reporting certainly isn’t a high priority when flying at 6000ft in the middle of the pacific! I guess they figured they didn’t need it.

I used to prep a/c for this trip, installing HF gear and the like. What I find unusual is that it departed KHWD instead of KOAK. Hayward has a 5,700’ runway whereas Oakland has 10,000’. I’ve seen some barely stagger off the ground in Oakland and barely clear the Golden Gate.

Also a little unusual that it’s now showing a G/S of 318 knots, but that’s another issue. I hope it holds for them!

Guess international waters, rules of the road don’t apply? Or is there different set of IFR rules for international waters as I would have thought Mode C would be required for the IFR part?

In fact, since there is a track log, they have Mode C, at least the way I understood Mode C to work???

At that low altitude, I wonder how the transponder can transmit that far?

He (or she) has made quite a bit of progress, though not exactly a direct shot, must be some weather or something for the trek to deviate north a bit or selecting that heading for better tail winds as the ground speed has picked up substantially.

Allen

That was clearly an anomaly, since the altitude had jumpted 3000 feet. Not unusual, as the very next entry showed 116 knots at 6000 feet instead of 9K.

Allen

It looks like they have turned back. I’m a bit confused, can somebody explain how a Cessna 172 is fitted to handle such a long flight, what the purpose of the flight would be, and why might they be turning back?

Maybe another anomaly, guess the next few minutes will tell.

Not unusual for ferry flights of this nature. The Cessna probably was outfitted with extra fuel tanks and got a ferry permit from the FAA.

Allen