Boss told me today he wants to fly to Juneau. I am really excited about that. I have been to 49 states. Guess which one i am missing. Just looking at it quickly looks like it could be a complicated flight plan to figure out. Ok experts I’m looking for your opinion.

C550 Raleigh, NC to Juneau, AK. Chime in please. KRDU/PAJN. I am so out of it I didn’t realize Alaska airports where P not K.

RDU to HCO to PAJN, can a II do 1440 miles on the second leg? The goal is to avoid Canada$$$$$$

Another thought it go a little further west in the US on the 1st leg and attempt to find two 1250nm legs also avoid Canada if it can't do the original second leg I proposed. I'm not positive on this but I don't think they charge airway fees if you don't land. If you have to pay airway fees, you are going to be shocked how expensive they are. I wouldn't doubt it if the fees were well over $1000.

In my little airplane, Navcanada charges me, I think, $17 per quarter (3 months) for the privaledge of using Canadian airspace.

If you want to avoid customs, you can go out to Seattle and up the coast. Only 500 miles is over Canada.

I have flown to Alaska 3 times and Canada hundreds of times. If it was me, I would just bite the bullet and do customs 4 times. Not that much of a big deal.

BTW, Juneau has terrible weather and difficult terrain. Worst place you could think of to fly to.

Going via SEA is 11% longer than the great circle and keeps you away from a lot of lonely territory.

Boss doesn't wanna fly first class for $1500 round trip?

My old man just went there about two weeks ago and shared with me this video of the approach that his co-pilot took. Pretty cool.

I've tried to upload it in HD, which when watched full screen makes the approach come alive [NOTE: looks like you must watch on youtube.com in order to see it in HD]. Notice the sequenced approach lead in lights (which I always call rabbits but I'm sure would be teased about it on BT ).

[youtube]https://youtu.be/JPbOtMlesMc[/youtube]

(I didn't ask him if I can share it publicly so I'll keep flight details and names private unless given permission)

Thank you for the video Tyler. I was thinking of avoiding Canada as well Micheal. Boss is thinking of an adventure and i am up for it. He has been doing the commercial thing. He is working on radar sites on several islands around Juneau to help with the weather issues there. Had to buy 12ga shotguns for the crew to protect from bears. I hope we can put this together. Yes he is a FAA contractor. We have been to Washington Center and New York Center and Chicago Center. Just a few sites he is working on.

Make sure you bring the correct ammunition for bears. Full bore slugs. Attached is an article regarding equipping your shotgun and the correct ammunition for bears. Have fun!

https://www.fieldandstream.com/blogs/gu ... mbo-alaska

Ken,
I would agree that overflying Canada is the best choice, and the thing that probably determines your route will be the leg length that the plane can do with adequate reserves.
Keep in mind that getting into Juneau in weather can be problematic because of the very high minimums.
A very good out is Yakutat about 170nm to the NW. The airport is located on an alluvial plain several miles from the mountains and you can go down to 200 - 1/2 on the good ILS.
If you are lucky and have really nice clear weather you will go crazy over the fabulous scenery.
I'm heading up there myself a week from Sunday but will be on my old standby Alaska Airlines..

I flew up the inside passage last week. departed from Friday Harbor and landed at Port Hardy, Sitka, Yakutat and Palmer. Only saw the ground when breaking out on the approach at each of those airports. Had hoped to view spectacular scenery along that route but all I saw were white clouds. Note that the minimums at Juneau are very high.

Since our family are Canpass Private Aircraft participants the stop at Port Hardy didn't even require a phone call. You might consider joining since it is very inexpensive. The customs guy at Sitka is extremely friendly so reentering the US was completely painless.

Fuel is another serious consideration, if the weather is crappy in Juneau as it apparently often is, making an unscheduled technical fuel stop in Canada is going to raise some eyebrows with no Canpass/no EAPIS, etc. Maybe you want to make the trip longer than it needs to be to give yourself the most fuel possible to land in Juneau to minimize the chance of landing at some Canadian outpost with $4/liter Jet A.

Take a few cans of Prist with you regardless, if you do end up getting gas in Canada, it usually has no Prist.

One nice thing about Canpass is you can usually clear customs over the phone by answering a few questions. Nice people those Canadians. However, the way they structure airway fees for a Bonanza is totally different than a jet. The rate charged might be 50 times higher; insane.

If you will stop in Canada, I would not bring the guns. They hate guns.

If you do bring guns, get lots of advice from somebody up there. Have gun serial numbers handy for paperwork, pack ammo separately from weapon, can't have a magazine that handles more than 5 bullets (IIRC), lot's of other issues. The Canadian regs for bringing a gun into the country, which I read once, are so complicated I could never absorb it all.

Ken,

I’ve flown to AK from the states (Navy P3 and C12 and corp G550) several times and I would add the following:

Do NOT short yourself on gas. The wx in SE AK is terrible and highly unpredictable. We nearly ran out of gas once in the C12 when it was supposed to be VFR all day. We ended up at our THIRD alternate. I’m not kidding.

The FAA has a series of wx cameras at lots of locations in AK so you can get a pilots eye view of what’s really going on at the airport. We ended up diverting once from PAGS when the ASOS was reporting 1200/3 (RNAV mins were 400/1). We even had EFVS in the G550 and couldnt get in. Neither could the AS737 ahead of us! The cameras don’t lie. Website is:
https://avcams.faa.gov/

Canada doesn’t charge any fees for overflights of jets < 40,000 lbs between “K” airports and “PA” airports. They have a very easy to use calculator on their website if you want to find out landing fees, etc. if you do decide to make a Canadian stop.

I’d try to get up to KBLI (only 800nm to PAJN from there) and then plan to land with tons of gas. The more options the better. PASI is usually a good alternate; 400/1 app mins.

Check FDC NOTAMs early; sometimes they will NOTAM out an approach into an airport that might be the only one you can shoot. That happened to us in PAJN once. The LDA was unusable for 3 weeks. And it is hardly ever VFR in Juneau.

Call me if you want to discuss further.

It is an amazing place to fly. You will have a blast.

Chris
616.901.7565

Be careful; Prist is considered Hazmat. While "will not carry" may not specifically apply to Part 91, if a can discharges it can be very dangerous to the occupants. Carriage and storage should be considered very carefully.

Brad

Thank you for all the reply’s suggestions and first hand reports. If we put this together I shall keep you all advised.