Video: By Cessna 172 over Alaska III.

Video: By Cessna 172 over Alaska III.    Today´s Alaska 2017 Expedition flight video follows the flight from Kodiak to Bering Strait. 

Departure from Kodiak was in sunny weather. I tried to find some bears, but I didn´t see any. After departure from Kodiak I flew almost three hours towards the North at an altitude of about 500 feet over the tundra. Then I landed for a brief rest at a gravel runway in the middle of nowhere. I had a problem departing as the surface at treshold of the runway was soft and my wheels got stuck. It took me an hour to get out of there. 

Aljaška 2017, 3. Kodiak - Portage Creek - Bethel - Unalakleet - Bering Strait

The next landing was at Bethel where I wanted to refuel. However, it was Sunday and the fuel was not available. I therefore decided to continue to Unalakleet.

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The last part of the flight was somewhat nervous as the headwind was quite strong and I did not have much fuel to spare.   

 In detail, about the Alaska 2017 expedition, read this on-line special. 

Unalakleet is an Eskimo settlement. There are no roads or railways there, and the sea is frozen for most of the year. There is at least a nice airport. I departed from Unalakleet the next morning in the direction of Bering Strait. I had to request a permission to fly into the ADIZ between the US and Russia. I got it without a problem but with it came a warning that I had to avoid crossing the bordeline at any cost. I did not want to cause an international problem so I did my best to stay on the U.S. side of the border. 

Between Little Diomede and the Great Diomede lies the border between the US and Russia and the date line runs through there as well. The cloud base was some 1500 feet high and the wind was strong. I stayed on the eastern side of Little Diomede to avoid the border and the wind rotors behind the high rocky island.

After having finished filming and taking photos, I returned to mainland Alaska, to an airstrip named Wales. I decided to land there. The wind was strong and turbulent. The first time I had to go around because of strong gusts of side wind. I only managed to land the second tame. After stopping I phoned our base in Prague via satellite phone to annonounce that I reached the mission objective – the Bearing Strait. 

Jiri Prusa