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We were up early and packing our trikes at the airport
before it started to get light. We checked the weather it looked OK for us although the satellite pictures revealed some storms nearby. We were in the tropics and it is impossible to always avoid rain and storms.
After filing a flight plan and paying the landing fees we took off for the flight to Nigeria. Both Olivier and I were quite anxious about the flight and what we were about to face in the worst country in the world
for bureaucracy, corruption and human rights abuses, a country embroiled in ethnic wars.
It didn't take long for us to experience the Nigerian
bureaucracy and harassment. As we passed Lagos the ATC demanded our authorisation numbers, details of the aircraft, the pilots and the owners and reminded us that our authorisation better be in order. Any moment I
expected to be told to divert to Lagos for interrogation, but we passed without too much trouble and were soon out of radio range.
After two hours of flying we decided to start heading
inland in a direct line to Port Harcourt, but after flying over the most inhospitable mangroves and incredibly high and dense forest for twenty minutes, lost our nerve and headed back to the coast. There were clouds
everywhere and we flew through some light rain occasionally. There was very little turbulence, but we had a slight headwind the whole day.
After another hour along the coast we steeled
ourselves and headed inland again. I looked down at the forest and saw that the trees were standing in water. We saw many large crocodiles in the brown rivers as we passed overhead. Whenever my shadow moved over a
croc it would dive wildly under the water. The trees were huge so I resolved to use the parachute in the event of an engine failure.
After being in the air for four and a half hours
Olivier and I started talking about our respective fuel levels and trying to calculate if we had enough to make it to Port Harcourt. We both had extra fuel with us but it meant landing somewhere with the possibility
of being arrested by the police or military. I was confident that I had enough fuel to make it easily to Port Harcourt, but Olivier voiced genuine concern about running out of fuel.
Thirty minutes to go before reaching Port Harcourt,
Olivier said that he needed to find a place to land to transfer fuel. The forest was extremely dense underneath us, but every now and then there was either a track or a road to one of the oilrigs and pipelines. We
flew quite close together looking for a suitable place for Olivier to land, but every time we found a good spot, there were people and houses nearby houses meant possible military and police and that could spell
disaster for us. Olivier was counting down the last of his fuel on his fuel gauge with increasing anxiety in his voice. Ten minutes before Port Harcourt, when we were already talking to the ATC and trying to deal
with their demands of authorisation numbers, heights and times, Olivier called me over the radio and said "chat, chat" which meant change to our chat frequency of the day
.. 123.40 MHz. With real concern in his
voice, Olivier said "my gauge is showing zero, f*ck, I have to land immediately." With sudden desperation I raced ahead searching for anywhere to land, first the main road, but there were people and cars. A side
road leading to an abandoned oil platform looked good. Olivier attempted a landing but the palm trees were too close to the road he called to say he couldn't make it just then I saw an abandoned road to the side
of the oil platform and shouted to Olivier to turn right. He banked right and dived for the road, disappearing between the trees. He was down safely. Some people nearby looked like they wanted to go to Olivier, so I
dived as low as I dared over the trees towards them and they ran away. I carefully pulled the refuelling hose out from under my camera bag, rolled it into a tight ball, and then flying with one hand overhead
Olivier, dropped it next to him.
I called the ATC at Port Harcourt to say that I had
made an error with my estimated arrival time and added five minutes. I circled over Olivier looking for approaching cars and people, but no one moved in his direction; instead they stood and watched me. I could see
Olivier running around his trike, working as fast as he could. My fuel gauge hovered between zero and twenty litres in the light turbulence, which was ample for the last ten minutes. After five minutes Olivier shot
into the air and raced towards me.
We landed at Port Harcourt and taxied towards the
parking area. I was amazed to see about thirty people, police and uniformed officials walking briskly towards us. Now what? I didn't even have my helmet off and they were saying, "welcome
. Your authorisation,
passport, papers!" I couldn't believe what I was seeing half of the people (mostly men, but about five women) had a little scrap of paper in their hands and a pen hovering, all scrambling for the authorisation
number. It seemed like every department at the airport, right down to the cleaners needed the number - I could only guess that they needed to write a report about us. We felt harassed and I tried to move away from
everyone asking me a question at the same time, but they just moved with me. Men and women were arriving in droves, some running towards us. After about three minutes I had had enough and raised my voice as loud as
I dared, talking to all of them and informed them that we were in transit, wanted to pay the fees, get fuel, file a flight plan and get out of there within thirty minutes, because otherwise we would have to land in
the dark in Douala. In reality we actually had a one-hour window.
Olivier was to arrange the fuel and I would do all
the administrative stuff. An air traffic controller showed me up to the tower, where we compared authorisation numbers. The number I had was different to their number and they started to indicate to me that they now
had a big problem, but I was firm and told them very sternly to call Lagos to get the right number. They realised how serious I was and I reminded them that if they delayed us and we had an accident because of their
negligence, they would be in big trouble. I realised that they took criticism very well and standing firm they backed off and let me continue. Next I paid the landing and navigation fees. There were four men
standing around one calculator all trying to do what they thought the calculation should be. It was like being in a movie. I didn't laugh, but the whole episode was absolutely hysterical. One man offered me four
dollars landing fees and thirty dollars navigation fees, which was the lowest numbers I had heard, so I said that I accept and they all immediately abandoned the calculator and waited for the money to arrive. I
paid, waited impatiently while one man took twenty minutes to write out one receipt, making ten mistakes in the process. After that I filed a flight plan, which went quite smoothly. When I handed the flight plan in
the man said to me "do you have something for me today?" I tried to judge the situation to work out if he would delay us if I didn't give him a few dollars, but decided to chance it and said a firm "no." It worked,
and within five minutes I was out of there. The ATC who had helped me had indicated that if he helped me get things done quickly, I should give him something so I reluctantly parted with ten Dollars.
I met Olivier in the passage leading out of the
airport building. He said that they had no Avgas and that he had ordered 100 litres of car fuel for 100 Dollars, which someone had gone to collect. OK, let's just get out of here. We had to see the immigration
officials first, though. In their office they looked at our passports and then said "OK, everything is fine, just pay the necessary fee of 20 Dollars each and you can go." Olivier and I hesitated for a moment and
then Olivier called their bluff and asked to see the regulation that mentions this fee. I left him to it and went back to the trikes to see if the fuel had arrived, which of course it had not. By now everyone knew
my name and they all wanted to shake my hand and ask the same questions one after the other. I was bombarded with questions. I gave quick answers and walked away as quickly as I could.
After twenty minutes Olivier arrived to say that they
pretended to search everywhere for the regulations, but eventually their chief walked in and told them to let us go. Now if the fuel would just arrive. One hour passed and we realised that we couldn't make it, so we
started planning the overnight stop. We moved the trikes between an abandoned Boeing 707 without engines and another old English airliner. The people lost interest in us and at times we only had three or four people
around us asking questions. Olivier went to change money and then sent a security officer off in a taxi to get fuel for us. The original fuel man arrived, still without the fuel and I gave him an earful.
Olivier arrived with the fuel, two cokes and a few bottles of water.
The security officials kept arriving and telling us
not to give anyone money, then asked if we would give them money to look after us. NO!!!!
At one stage the immigration officials arrived and
told me they had to keep our passports, but Olivier intervened and grabbed my passport out of his hand and zipped it into his flight suit pocket, saying we would NOT hand our passports over again. The man walked off
defeated.
As the sun started to set we decided to take the
wings off the trikes and move everything under the one wing of the 707, because there was a huge thunderstorm moving towards us.
Olivier gave me a sleeping tablet and before it was
even dark I was asleep under the 707 wing.
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