Some Delta passengers are going to spend Christmas near the North Pole
Dec 25, 2018, 9:47 pm
#46
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As I said in my very first post, it was tongue-in-cheek. I know where SYA is in relation to the North Pole — but it is very much as remote, if not more so.
Dec 26, 2018, 8:35 am
#47
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The affected airplane (N1612T) left Shemya for Seattle yesterday, and will be back in the regular rotation today. So, it does not look like the repair needed was too extensive.
Dec 26, 2018, 9:45 am
#48
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Having been to both, I would far prefer to divert to CDB than SYA, Cold Bay is closer to the rest of the country, and is civilian and so you can have the run of the town such that it is. At SYA, you would have military guards and the weather starts at bad and goes down from there.
I'm glad to not have been a part of it but reading about it had been interesting
Dec 26, 2018, 11:52 am
#49
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https://www.adn.com/alaska-news/arti...ay/2013/10/30/
There's no road out of Cold Bay.
Dec 26, 2018, 12:16 pm
#50
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Dec 26, 2018, 12:27 pm
#51
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Dec 26, 2018, 12:36 pm
#52
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Here is the post.
There's some discussion about this on airliners.net (https://www.airliners.net/forum/view...?f=3&t=1411327) including a link to a Flickr album showing some pretty cool photos of the previous Delta diversion to Cold Bay. 
Dec 26, 2018, 3:38 pm
#53
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What is Alaska flying to Adak? IIRC, they retired the use of their combination cargo and pax aircraft. The flight flies TSA with them because none are stationed there.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adak,_Alaska
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adak,_Alaska
Dec 26, 2018, 4:20 pm
#54
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Dec 26, 2018, 10:53 pm
#55
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Dec 27, 2018, 2:40 am
#56
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ETOPS
Dual engine planes that lose an engine can not maintain a cruising altitude. In other words, on one engine only, they will be descending, slowly, but surely. The flight plan takes this into account to make sure they are never too far from a diversion airport.
During the Cold War, SYA was the primary base for our Cobra Ball mission. They took off in a RC-135, within 15 minutes (I think) every time the USSR launched a missile. They would then take pictures of the re-entry vehicle as it came down over the northern Pacific.
Dec 27, 2018, 6:36 am
#57
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Last edited by HDQDD; Dec 27, 2018 at 7:12 am
Dec 27, 2018, 6:56 am
#58
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What is Alaska flying to Adak? IIRC, they retired the use of their combination cargo and pax aircraft. The flight flies TSA with them because none are stationed there.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adak,_Alaska
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adak,_Alaska
The TSA did fly out and back and I learned that they travel on revenue tickets that is being paid for by the tax payers as they don't have adequate people in Adak to support a full time location so they're all MVP Golds and above and can be seen sitting in First Class.
It's most likely the 73G as the 738/739 would be too much capacity for ADK.
Dec 27, 2018, 8:22 am
#59
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https://www.avs.org/AVS/files/c7/c7e...de54f87b9e.pdf
That yields less lift from the wings.
Dec 27, 2018, 8:57 am
#60
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The atmosphere is much less dense at 35K feet (roughly about 25% of the density at sea level.)
https://www.avs.org/AVS/files/c7/c7e...de54f87b9e.pdf
That yields less lift from the wings.
https://www.avs.org/AVS/files/c7/c7e...de54f87b9e.pdf
That yields less lift from the wings.