Flying the Piaggio at 41,000 Feet (Max Altitude!)
Hello from beautiful Jackson Hall, Wyoming, one of my all-time favorite airports to fly out of. We're back in the Piaggio; you guys have been asking for more content with this thing, so here we are. Today, we're going to push this airplane to its limits, going up to 41,000 ft. So strap in, let's go to California baby!
Everything's all right with a violet sky on my skin. Ooh baby, I feel hot with the violet sky on my [Music]. Let me breathe deep, let me get away. There's no place else I'd rather be. Whoa, everything's all right with a violet sky.
All right guys, I'm just going to pick up my clearance. We'll fire up and get out of here.
"Hey Ground, Piaggio 9851, we're looking for IFR to San Jose."
"Piaggio 9851, Jackson Ground, clear to San Jose Airport, Alpine 4 departure, Idaho Falls transition as filed. Climb via SID, accept, maintain 16,000. Departure frequency Salt Lake Center 133.25, squawk 0504."
"All right, Piaggio 9851, we're cleared to San Jose via the Alpine 4 departure, Idaho Falls transition, then as filed. Climb via the SID, accept maintain 16,000. Departure frequency 133.25, squawk 0504."
"Piaggio 9851, reback correct, thank you."
"Thanks! We'll call you for taxi."
Got to think of that right here, my bad. Just copying this straight from the flight plan that I filed, Chibii and the Bricks 4, so we can actually load Chibii off the arrival here, San Jose, Bricks 4, Chibii, ILS 30 left off Clyde. Boom! All right, that's all set. Let's fire up and get out of here.
Jackson information Hotel 0056 Zulu, wind 190 at 8 knots, visibility 1 statute mile. Sky condition few clouds at 1,500, temperature 19, dew point 3, altimeter 3 018, density altitude 8,200. Runway 19 in use, expect ILS Zulu Runway 19 approach. CFR aircraft avoid runway extended centerline. Hazardous weather information available. Service frequency advise on initial contact you have hotel.
"Call for taxi please."
"Piaggio 9851 at the FBO, taxi with hotel."
"Piaggio 851, re taxi Alpha 1."
"Io 851 Piaggio 851, do you have time for a question?"
"Go ahead."
"Piaggio 851, saw that you are filming. Do you have any film coming in and out of Jackson? We're trying to put together a pilot briefing video for us in FAA, and we don't have any footage."
"Yeah, just send me a message on Instagram or YouTube, and I've got a good amount of footage over the years coming in and out of here that might be helpful for you."
"Piaggio 851, that is the best news I've heard in months. Thank you!"
"No problem."
Well, now you know guys, if anyone has good footage coming in and out of Jackson Hole here, they're looking for some. I know Citation Max has some.
All right, well Chris, welcome back to the channel! You haven't been here in a minute. It's been, I think, since that Conquest video; that was the last one you were on with me. I think I was just a private pilot back then. Yeah, pretty early on. So we'll catch everybody up on your progress with flying. I'm sure they're going to be very surprised when they hear what you're up to.
But in the meantime, thanks for coming along and help me sling gear and get us back to San Jose.
All right, taxi checks are good. Crew briefing: it'll be a left seat takeoff. If we have to return for any reason, anything urgent, we'll come back here. The only thing is, they don't have much maintenance here, so if we can limp it to DGGS, they have much better facilities just over the hill. But you know, we won't mess around; if we have to come back, we'll come right back.
Y, and it's good to have you guys back in the Piaggio. It's been a while since I've done some Piaggio content. I've got a lot of crazy stuff coming; I'm not going to tell you exactly what it is yet. I'll give you a hint: it has to do with flying over large bodies of water. So make sure you like and subscribe and stay tuned for some pretty crazy content coming up.
But for now, we're doing a nice flight from Jackson Hole back to our home base of San Jose, and we're going to see if we can push this thing to its limits, go up to 40,000 ft, but maybe wrong direction; up to 41, max service ceiling for this airplane. So we'll see what they give us.
In the meantime, Chris, you want to switch over to Tower departure frequency? It's 133.25.
"Piaggio 9851, Jackson, to use caution, single mauve, left of Runway 19, departure in wind 2804. Runway 19 cleared for takeoff."
"Roger, Runway 19 cleared for Piaggio 9851."
All right, approach looks clear. I'll clear the departure in a second. Bleeds are coming on, PEDs coming on, windshield to low, auto feather arm. All right, you all set?
"Set."
All right, we got two good engines, power is set, speed's alive, 60. Steering's off. Oh yeah, she's ready to fly!
All right, we got a positive rate, out of Runway, gears coming up, flaps are coming up, auto feather sync.
"Piaggio 851, have a fantastic night. Contact departure over at departure 8, Seattle."
"Piaggio 9851, 8.3, climbing 6000."
"9851, Center radar contact, 2 miles south of Jackson Airport."
"Checks up to, Piaggio 851 November."
"9851, contact Lake Center 2835."
"2835, 851, Seattle Center, Piaggio 9851, climbing 240."
"9851, Center climb and maintain flight level 320."
"320, 851."
All right, out of 18. 2992 with a violet sky on my skin. Ooh baby, I feel hot with a violet sky on my skin. Let me breathe deep, let me get away. There's no place else I'd rather be.
All right guys, just leveled off FL340 in the Piaggio. Winds are dying down; just back there, it was about 80 knots, but we're down to 66 now—not directly on the nose, so that's good. So we're accelerating 340 over the ground, but 372 true and still accelerating!
Chris, welcome back! It's been, shoot, like 2 years since we've done flight together for the channel. You've been up to some crazy stuff; you've added a couple of ratings and added some hours. Why don't you tell us what you've been up to?
"Yeah, bounced around between a couple States and couple jobs. Later, currently flying a G4 around the country. Just got that job a couple of months ago, passed my line check a few weeks ago, and here we are now."
"Thank you. You're 22, you have how many hours?"
"I just hit 1,200 hours."
"1,200 hours? That is crazy! You have 1,200 hours; you're flying a G4? Wow, congrats! That’s crazy."
So when we flew last, we were flying the Conquest in LA. That was probably two, two and a half years ago, maybe? You were working on your ratings, right?
"I think correct. You either just came back from Minnesota where you did an accelerated course and finished them, or you were just about to go. But anyways, you got all your ratings—multi, commercial, and from all that good stuff. But you only had about 4,500 hours, so you have the qualifications but you don't have the experience."
"So walk us through then to now. So you have 500 hours. How did you go from that to becoming a G4 pilot? What'd you do?"
"Yeah, so after I came back from the Midwest with my ratings, I was just looking for any opportunity I could to build time. I started ferrying airplanes, sitting in the right seat and doing contract trips—just anything I could to log some sort of flight time and get some experience. Just making as many connections as I could along the way. Eventually, that landed me an opportunity up in Washington of all places, with a pretty well-known company called Kenw. They're known for their seaplane operation; they're the largest and oldest seaplane operation in the country, but they also have Caravans and PC-12s, which is what I was on since I don't have a seaplane rating yet. But I got that opportunity."
"And how many hours did you have when they hired you?"
"Maybe 500 or 600 at the time."
"That's crazy! So they were the first ones to call you?"
"Yeah, I was applying everywhere I could—places that I was very well below the minimums. Because at the end of the day, the requirements you see on the application, it's just a wish list of what they want. You know, if you have the personality and the experience to go along with it, and you just show a willingness to learn and build time, that's what they're looking for."
"So you packed your bags, huh?"
"Yeah, they said hey, did the interview, it went pretty well. They got back to me saying, 'Hey, can you move up here in like a week or so?' I said absolutely. It was the first opportunity I can get; within three or four days, I was on my car, packed up, and moving out to Seattle."
"Yeah, it was fast. And that's a big move! I mean, your first time kind of living out on your own, pretty much."
"Yeah, and I mean that just goes to show the sacrifices you have to make in this industry to get to that next level; the next step in your career sometimes means moving to another state across the country, whatever it may be to chase that next opportunity. So good on you for doing that, going outside your comfort zone. You know a lot of people will just sit back and not be willing to make a big move like that, so that was definitely a game changer and helped get you to where you are today."
"So about you moved up to Seattle, flew? What'd you do next?"
"They put me in the right seat of the Caravan. Great experience; learned my first time flying 135, a little bit different than I was, but experienced my first Seattle winter. So plenty of IMC time; I logged almost 75 hours of actual while I was up there during the six-month span, so that was a great experience flying mostly steam gauges, a couple glass. But after a couple hundred hours in the Caravan, they put me in the right seat of the PC-12."
"Started playing that around?"
"And you were able to log that because they have a program that approved by the FAA to be for two crew in both the Caravan and the PC-12. So that's all loggable time, and my captains were fantastic—most of them were retired military, retired airline. You know, they have tons of experience; some have tens of thousands of hours. But everyone had a different background; it was really cool to see their perspectives. Every Captain has their own little ways of doing things, and you just kind of pick up what they put down. Great experience flying up there in the weather and learning about all sorts of weather conditions: icing, how to handle that, so great experience."
"So you flew, you were up there for six months; you flew how many hours?"
"Probably about 450 hours up there."
"That's crazy! So now you're at about 1,100 hours. Then what happened?"
"I actually had a trip down in the Bay Area; this was a contract trip aside from what I was doing up in Seattle. It landed me back home in the Bay Area, and I ran into a company that I was initially applying to way back in the day before I even moved up to Seattle. They have a couple jets, and they actually used to operate out of the airport that I worked at when I was working in the FBO. So I would see them all the time. I kind of joked about, 'You know, I'd love to fly with you guys someday.' And they're like, 'Oh yeah, send us a resume when you get the qualifications.' And yeah, you know, two years later, here we are. You know, I have a little over a thousand hours, a bunch of turbine time, these are heavy metal airplanes we're talking G4, even some airliner-type aircraft. Like, this is some heavy iron."
"So yeah, there I was stepping out of my little Citation, and they've got a G4 in front of me, and I'm like, 'Hey, I want to work for you guys!' And yeah, you know, just talking to someone goes a long way. Hand them a resume and within a couple weeks, we got an interview set up, and that went pretty well."
"Well, in the meantime it took a lot of vouching! I mean, you had to list how many references?"
"I had about four or five references. Called every single one."
"Called every one of them?"
"And they went to pretty in-depth phone calls, from what I understand."
"Yep, they did. You know, I'm going against people who are retired airline who have, you know, tens of thousands of hours and type ratings—737 and 757—and I'm just a little 22-year-old kid with a thousand hours and, you know, very limited jet experience."
"But they hired you!"
"They hired me, yeah. Very grateful for that."
"Moved back from Seattle, and now you're flying G4 out of the Bay Area?"
"Yep."
"So if you hadn't worked for the FBO years ago, this opportunity would not have happened, huh?"
"Probably not. I mean that's kind of where I planted the seed back when I was 17, 18 years old working at the FBO. They would come in, you know, on a pretty regular basis, and we kind of built that foundation from there. And you know, shook every hand I could with that company and everyone I saw that flew in with them."
"No, you like literally everything I tell people if they're trying to make it in corporate aviation, you've done. You worked at the FBO, which is a great opportunity to build connections and get experience hands-on in the field. You said yes to the first opportunity and packed your bags and moved. You hustled and went and found the next opportunity way sooner than I would have thought. This is going to continue to open even more; you know, could lead to a G650 or something. What it's all about, so it's a great story."
"Thanks for sharing. Really happy about all the success; I'm stoked for you to learn the G4, and hopefully we'll fly together somehow soon."
"So now we're all caught up with Chris. This is what you guys are waiting for! You guys want to see us push the Piaggio to its max service ceiling, 41,000 ft. It'll do it! It's a little bit warm today; it's plus-n ISA, so we might have to do some step climbs, maybe even ask for a block altitude. We are going westbound, so technically we won't be allowed to 41; but we'll see if they can give us a wrong direction climb. We also need to take into consideration the supplemental oxygen regulation, so above 35, even though there are two pilots up here, this is still a single pilot aircraft, so Chris is technically a passenger on this flight. So above 35, I'm going to throw the oxygen mask on. I mean, it's a good idea regardless. Even if you were here, the time of useful consciousness up there is very, very short, and I don't want to mess around with that. We'll start a climb, I'll put on an oxygen mask, check on with you guys in a little bit; fingers crossed they'll let us up there!"
All right guys, here we are, flight level 410 in the Piaggio! This is crazy, a turboprop doing 40,000 ft—absolutely unreal!
All right, so let's look at some of the numbers up here at 40,000. We're still accelerating a little bit, but we're currently doing 340 over the ground, 30 knots of wind. True airspeed is 360 knots, fuel flow about 500 lb an hour—that's 75 gallons total. That's just crazy. So obviously, it's not super practical to run it this high all the time; its sweet spot's in the mid-30s. But that just goes to show the capabilities of this incredible airplane!
Do you want to see if they can get us wrong direction up to 410 just for a few minutes, and then we'll go back down to 34 so I can take this mask off? It's super uncomfortable.
"Go for yourself, and Center, Piaggio 9851, request."
"Go ahead."
"Hey, I'd like to request wrong direction 410 for about 5 to 10 minutes."
"Piaggio 9851, maintain 410."
"Thank you, sir! Up to 410, 51."
Awesome! All right, let's go up to 41.
All right, here we go! Just leveled off flight level 410 in the Piaggio. We did it! In step climbs, which definitely helps, but got up here no problem. ISA plus zero—piece of cake!
And guys, for reference, 41,000 ft is our typical cruising altitude in the G4. So to be up here in a turboprop is pretty unreal! So there you go, flight 410 in the Piaggio.
We're going to go back down now because I hate wearing this mask, and again if something happens, we don't have a lot of time to react. So I have Chris take me back down at 340. But there you guys see the performance numbers up here are absolutely insane—41,000 ft! So let's go back down.
[Music]
The way, oh way, baby! [Music]
Baby!
All right guys, and we're back here at 340. Nice to have my mask off again—it was a little uncomfortable, and can't really talk to you guys out of it. But now that it's off, we can recap what we just did. So hope you guys enjoyed the brief experience of high ops in the Piaggio, taking it to the max altitude 41,000 ft. We can't go a foot higher—literally certified 410!
Like I said, it's not very practical up there. The fuel burn's incredible up there—500 lb per hour. The performance is not quite there; it definitely likes the mid-30s, and that's where it's really comfortable for us. Because if something were to go wrong, not a lot of time to react. All around, a lot more comfortable here at 340.
So we just came back down. That goes to show; if you need to go up to 41, it'll do it! Talk about capable—41,000 ft in a turboprop? Absolutely insane!
"Center, contact 13497."
"3497, 851."
See United, you can have whatever you like. Don't you know the political climate right now? You can have it all, perhaps.
"Oh, actually, I can't do Olympia, but I can do MCK. Is that one good enough?"
"Yeah, MCK is wonderful."
"Horizon 2047, appreciate it!"
"Horizon Air 2047, proceed direct MCK."
"MCK, Horizon Air 2047, you're an awesome controller, sir! I am so bored right now. I'm just trying to live it up!"
"That's some request. Direct San."
"Piaggio 9851, flight level 340."
"9851, good evening, sir!"
"Good evening! You offering shortcuts today, huh? Pass for aggressive, I speak your style! How about G, and then eventually we'll do Z?"
"9851, direct GRIO."
"Ah, you read my mind! Direct GRIO, 851, appreciate it."
Got to move out of the way!
[Music]
All right, so let's look at this arrival we're doing into San Jose. We are doing the Bricks 4, so this arrival takes you up over Sacramento, close to Santa Rosa, and then takes you down the west side of the peninsula over San Francisco down into S.
I'll have Sean overlay a chart of the arrival into San Jose. A few things we have to keep in mind on this arrival, there are some altitude restrictions, hard altitude restrictions, as well as some hard speed restrictions. So we'll go over those together, make sure they're correct in the box, and that the airplane's going to fly them.
We are coming in over GRIO; shout out to Oakland Center for the little shortcut bypassing SHIBL. So GRIO, as you can see on the chart, we have to be above flight level 220, hard 280 knots. Now, there's a problem; we can't do 280 knots max at 260. But no worries, we'll just tell Center, 'Hey, can we get some relief on the speed?' Best we can give you is 260. More than likely, they'll say yes; if not, we'll have to figure out a plan B, maybe another arrival or vector somewhere. But I think 99% of the time, they'll say speeds are relieved when you just can't do it.
So, Piaggio, 220 to 260 knots; no restriction at ZENKOR above 14. I am double checking these in the box, so this is all checked out good. Bricks hard 12, just make sure we're on the same page here, guys. A line above and below the number means hard altitude, hard speed, whatever it may be, we must be at that number.
A line below, let's say at GRIO, the line is below 220—that's 220 or above; we just can't cross GRIO below it. So we got Bricks, then we got LU, that's hard at 12,000 ft. And after that, on this little description here, it tells you exactly what to do. So on track 140, we'll expect radar, so we'll just fly that track 140 and wait for them to give us a vector or maybe direct Clyde to join the ISS, whatever it may be. There you go, that's it—pretty simple.
So we just got to make sure that we're on our game—the airplane's doing what we want it to do in terms of the altitudes; I'm doing what I need to be doing in terms of the speeds. No room for error here, very busy airspace flying right over the top of San Francisco, so got to make sure everything's going as planned.
Sound good?
"Sounds like a plan!"
Cool!
"13 visibility, 1, two clouds at 1,400, temperature 22, altimeter 29.95. IFR Yankee, clear for visual runway 30 left approach, and departing runway 30 left."
[Applause]
"951, proceed in Zulu, India, triple November, maintainable 240."
"All right, direct and down to 240, 851, thanks."
"OAL Center, Piaggio 9851, 270, descending 240."
"Piaggio 9851 in about a minute."
"All right, November 9851, descend via Bricks 4 arrival, San Jose, altitude 296."
"All right, descend via the Bricks 4 arrival, 851."
"96 set, 12,000, I see it's 12. We're VAV, so we'll just take her straight down."
"851, best we can give you on the speed is 260 now."
"Do that work?"
"851, speed your discretion. Let NorCal know as well."
"All right, I appreciate that, thanks!"
"All right, so all good, speeds are your discretion, 260 will work. We'll let NorCal know, and all is well."
"November 851, contact NorCal approach, 13.9, or 5, advise your speed."
"All right, we'll code 3395, 851. See you!"
"Piaggio 9851, we're 196, descending via Bricks 4 at 260 knots."
[Applause]
"9851 Nor, Rogers Standard, the altimeter is 299.6. Information Victor, turn."
"And I left that part out; we do have Victor!"
"851, thanks! 9851 descends to maintain 7,000."
"Right down to 7,000, 851."
All right, so notice how he said, 'descend and maintain 7,000.' That means we no longer have to descend via the arrival, so we can now disregard—we just passed Bricks, but we could have disregarded the 12,000 crossing restriction at Bricks. And obviously, we're going to disregard LEUTHA at 12,000 because we're going down to seven. But 'descend via' and 'descend and maintain' are two very different clearances.
"851, turn left heading 070."
"Left 070, 851."
"Casual 851, maintain 4,000."
"4,000, 851, down we go."
"Casual 851, the airport's 10:00 and about six miles inside."
"851, clear visual approach 3 left."
"Clear visual 3 left, 851."
All right, radar contact, six miles northeast.
[Applause]
"4,700, 124.0. Have a good one!"
"Have a good night, 851! We'll see you!"
"851, hey, just flipped the switch. We're visual 3 left."
"851, caution, 321 just 3 left, cleared land."
"Cleared land, 3 left, 851."
"13, contact Norbridge, 1-2-1.3."
"All right, Chris, you want to start working those props to full forward?"
"Yamps away, 500, final low level, low."
"800, Cas 851 left golf ground, 7. Good night!"
"Golf 7, 851, good night."
All right guys, welcome back to San Jose! That's a wrap. Hope you guys enjoyed another episode in the Piaggio P180, pushing it to its limits—literally to the limit, 41,000 ft! Can't go any higher; it's been a long day for us; we're exhausted. We're going to go home, but stay tuned for more.
I got some really exciting stuff in the works; you'll definitely want to subscribe and see that stuff. Let us know what you think of this airplane—41,000 ft for a turboprop? Absolutely incredible! So hope you guys enjoyed that and we'll see you guys on the next one!
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[Applause]
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