We’re currently at 3,200 feet over the ocean, and it’s raining so hard I’m looking for Noah on the TCAS. We’ve slowed down to around 180 knots—not because ATC asked us to—but because we are buying time. We’re in uncontrolled airspace, ATC is thousands of miles away, and so my only concern is terrain; but the ride is smooth, even in the weather. Getting in is, at best, questionable, but the fellow on the ground who is reading us the weather has just advised us that we can (currently) get in. We need a ceiling of 460 feet and a visibility of two miles, and as hard as it is to believe, he is reporting better than that. To my right is not only the airport, but the nearly 2,100 feet of mountain that is between me and it.
We have a couple of hours of extra fuel, and as of now, we have no reason not to try. So, without further ado, I turn the airplane towards the initial approach fix, execute the command on the FMS, and watch it join the course. Meanwhile, outside it continues to rain. Hard. I mentally rehearse the steps for a missed approach, and then verbalize them for my own benefit. The captain follows along by mimicking the hand motions.
Out my window, I begin to see the clouds break up. I see the water below us, and even a brief glimpse of the shore. It doesn’t last long. We turn final, and I call for the gear to come down and for flaps 15. There is a familiar, comforting sound that an airplane makes when the gear extends, and then locks. The nose pitches over just a bit to maintain the descent commanded by the autopilot. I call for flaps 30, then 40, and we finish the Before Landing checklist. The rain is easing off, and as we descend through 1,000 feet, the terrain to my right becomes more visible. It’s also a reminder not to turn right in the event of a missed approach. That thought turns my attention to the front windows. In my hands I can feel the autothrottles and the autopilot working their magic. Just a few hundred feet to go. I turn off the autopilot, because I will have to make a turn to join the final if we see the runway. The terrain precludes a straight-in approach.
The captain is just beginning to call for a go-around when the runway comes into view. I start a descent, and together, we realize that this just isn’t going to work. This is no place to try to salvage an approach.
Not just an airline
This isn’t your typical general aviation story. It isn’t even your typical aviation story. The airport is not your typical airline destination, and this is not your typical trip. The destination was Kosrae (pronounced kose-rye), an island in the Federated States of Micronesia (FSM)—an island nation in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, less than 400 miles from the Equator. This is the third stop on the Island Hopper.
The Island Hopper is a legacy of the old Air Micronesia, an airline started in part by Continental Airlines in 1968. Air Mike, as it was affectionately called, was based and headquartered on the island of Guam. While other routes eventually sprouted from Guam to cities in Japan, China, Australia, and the Philippines, the bread and butter was the Hopper. In time, Continental acquired complete ownership of the company. Today, it operates as a part of the merged United Airlines.
The Hopper is not just an airline route. It’s a lifeline, a necessary and required part of the lives of the people in the FSM and the Marshall Islands. It began with Teflon-coated 727s and coral runways. Today, the airplane is the Boeing 737-800 and the runways are all paved, although most are relatively short. The longest is on the atoll of Majuro (7,800 feet). The shortest is here in Kosrae, at 5,700 feet.
Three days a week, Flight 155 leaves Guam early in the morning and heads for Chuuk, the first leg of the trip. The wind that whips around Chuuk makes it one of the more challenging approaches because of the wind shear produced. It’s also the longest leg, at an hour and 40 minutes block to block. Doing the walkaround will give you an idea of just how different this trip is from most—instead of watching the belt loaders send luggage and golf clubs into the belly bins, there are a lot of coolers that are taped shut. They contain food, medicine, and fragile items that are otherwise hard to come by in the islands. There are dozens of boxes of mail, live roosters, wheelchairs, even refrigerators. Even the regular luggage is oversized. The few tourists that we do carry often have bags of scuba gear for Chuuk, which is a bucket-list destination for divers who come to explore the more than 70 Japanese ships and airplanes that were sunk here by the United States in World War II.
Also loaded before I got to the airplane was the spare parts kit. Because of the nature of the route, we will carry a pallet of carefully chosen parts for the airplane, including a spare tire, in case we break down. We will also carry a mechanic with us, who will do his own preflight inspection each leg, in addition to the one that the pilots do. He’ll service the oil as needed, cool the brakes with fans, and put on the fuel at each station. Because of the long stretch of open water with little in the way of suitable landing alternates, the route requires airplanes that are capable of extended-range twin-engine operations (ETOPS). Prior to an ETOPS flight, the mechanic will do an inspection specific to ETOPS operations and sign it off in the logbook. The mechanic (and the spare parts kit) are offloaded in Majuro. We also carry an extra flight attendant and two relief pilots. The flight crews will switch positions in Majuro.
The passengers are another indication that this a different kind of trip. Many are returning to their islands after receiving medical care—either on Guam or, more likely, in Manila. The carry-on bags are an extension of what is being loaded: grocery bags, small boxes of household goods, clothes, and shoes. The people that we are taking home generally are poor, and what they take with them are items we take for granted.
From Chuuk we will head to Pohnpei. The numbers of passengers on each leg from here to the end will fluctuate. Very few will ride all the way from Guam to Honolulu, but a few do. In fact, there are passengers who are living a dream of their own by experiencing the Hopper. The folks that we pick up from here on out are a mix of scientific researchers, government contractors, service providers, and missionaries. We will also bring on a number of folks needing medical care, but these are heading primarily to Hawaii or to the mainland for their needs. Several times I have brought human remains back to Pohnpei. It’s a sobering sight as the caskets are offloaded, inspected, and turned over to the families.
Island to island
The Hopper is a Spartan operation. There are no jet bridges on the islands, so each has a set of air stairs. The terminals are bare-bones. Many of the employees at the various stations have worked there for years, and they know many of the pilots very well. There is a team atmosphere, a sense of purpose in getting as much payload as possible on each flight. Overflights are relatively rare, but they do happen, and almost always because of the weather. The need to maximize payload often means that we can’t carry a lot of extra fuel to wait out the latest storm. My flight into Kosrae is an exception.
When flying east, Kosrae follows Ponhpei. The other islands have their runways shoehorned into the existing landscape, but Kosrae’s airport is on a man-made island. I wish they’d made it longer. This is an island I’d like to spend some time on, as it is visually stunning and is so remote. Only 30 percent of it is inhabitable.
After Kosrae, we head to Kwajalein—which, like Chuuk, is famous for its role in World War II. The island is still a U.S. military outpost, so unless you are doing business here or staying with a family that lives here, you can’t stay. If the airplane is overweight or if a nonrevenue pass rider gets stuck, things get interesting.
The flight from Kwaj to Majuro is the shortest at 45 minutes, but the ground times can be long because of security procedures. Some of the galley is also re-stocked here. Until recently, the airport at Kwaj was the only one with a control tower. It has since been shut down, supposedly only temporarily. Time will tell.
Majuro is the last of the atolls we will see (it’s also home of the best tuna steak sandwich money can buy). From here, the leg to Honolulu is nearly five hours long. The westbound Hopper, Flight 154, will come through tomorrow, and the kit will be reloaded going to Guam, and the mechanic will rejoin the westbound flight as well.
When the 727 was flying this route, it couldn’t make the leg from Majuro to Honolulu, so it would land on Johnston Island for fuel. Johnston has since been shuttered. If our dispatcher determines that we need an alternate besides Majuro or Hawaii, we are filed slightly north of the airway—believe it or not, there are airways out here—so we can use Midway. This, understand, is a last resort. It brings little peace of mind as it’s so far out of the way and largely unattended. But it’s there. In July 2014, a 777 en route to Guam from Honolulu was forced to divert to Midway.
Bringing home the bacon
All radio communications are done with high frequency (HF) radios. Clearances are in the same format as you learn for flying IFR out of nontowered airports in the United States. Remember those position reports you read about so long ago, but probably have never done? Those are an integral part of the process out here, and they are all handled by San Francisco Radio using the HF radio or the on-board satellite phone. The weather can wreak havoc with communications when controllers and aircraft are thousands of miles apart, and on those days or individual legs where you can’t raise anyone on the radio or the sat phone, it becomes necessary to resort to using a landline. This is an airline, but in many ways, it’s a pure GA operation, which (to me) adds to the fun.
The remote aspect of what we do out here is driven home by the fact that there is almost never any traffic in the area. While some airlines will stop in Majuro or Kosrae while repositioning airplanes from the states, there is scant traffic. The flight to Honolulu, which always takes place after dark, is a long, lonely one. Air Mike is, even after 40 years of service, the only game in town. If we don’t get in, there may not be another flight for seven or even 10 days.
I am often reminded of the song lyric: “Seven thirty seven comin’ outta the sky.” In this case, the 737 in question might be mine, and I know that these folks are counting on me to, literally, bring home the bacon, and nobody relaxes until the wheels actually touch down. The Hopper has evolved over time, and the FAA has had to issue several exemptions in order for the operation to be successful given the geographic challenges. The pilots are a unique bunch, as are the flight attendants. The days are long—the duty day is 16 hours and the total flight time is in excess of 11 hours. The reward is an extended stay in Hawaii.
After our missed approach in Kosrae, we cleaned up the airplane, set up the approach again, and flew it one more time. There was no traffic, so there was no rush. This time we saw the runway well before the minimum descent altitude. With the autopilot off, I turned slightly right, and then back left to join the final. We’re the first flight to land here in more than a week.
My landing isn’t too bad—style points don’t count out here, anyway—and we taxi to the gate. When the door opens, one of the agents comes into the cockpit as we finish the Parking Checklist.
“Boy, are we glad to see you.” Her smile is all the thanks I need.
Chip Wright is an airline pilot and frequent contributor to AOPA publications.
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