If you fly the corridor, you should prepare for landing in the water in case of an emergency. There is no open places to land a plane in Manhattan or nearby. An emergency situation at 1500 feet (the altitude most appropriate for site-seeing operation in B), will give you a gliding distance of only a couple of miles. That means landing in the Hudson river. I have considered Governer's Island in case of an emergency near Statue of Liberty though.
Landing in water with wife and two kids (none of them can swim) in a high-wing, fixed-gear aircraft is a certain disaster. The plane would sink like a rock, leaving no time for a rescue. All my trust on proper pre-flight. These accident rarely happen and are probably as deadly as getting in a car wreck on a freeway. It will be my first and last time carrying a full plane of non-swimmers to the Hudson Corridor.
Enough about safety.
The most exciting part of the flight was flying right over Newark Liberty Airport (KEWR) at 1500 feet. But the biggest let-down of the trip was New Jersey itself.
White Plains (KHPN) is my favorite airport for overnight trip to Manhattan. The airport has good fuel prices, no landing fees, and free overnight parking with fifteen gallons of gas purchase. The train ride from the airport to Manhattan is only thirty minutes.
I decided to go to KMMU (Morristown-Parsippany) this time, just for adventure. I taxied to FTC (one of the two FBO's on the airport) who charged me $50 for overnight parking and ramp fee. I have never paid so much for overnight parking for a Cessna. The FBO was run down and the staff was not very friendly.
Avoid KMMU and FTC.
We called the cab. It arrived an hour after the call. The fare from KMMU to Hilton Parsippany (about five miles) was $30.
We had plans to visit Mahattan, but the train from Morristown to Manhattan, and back costs $34 per person, and was one hour and thirty minutes each way. We did not have time and money for Manhattan this time. We decided to eat at a restaurant inside the hotel, and then went to beds. Some places are extremely unfriendly (and expensive) to people relying on public transportation, and Morristown tops the list.
The Hilton (4-star so to speak) staff was extremely unfriendly. There was a wedding party in the hotel, and people were obnoxiously loud in their celebration mood. The noise died down round 2 AM, and we were asleep sometime after that.
In the morning, as expected, it was a one hour journey (most of it spent in cab waiting time) from the hotel to the airport.
I indicated to the KMMU tower that I wanted to fly the Hudon corridor. I was handed over to Newark immediately after take off.
If you plan to fly the corridor sometime in the safety of B, you must be quick with your radios. You will be handed over from Newark tower to LaGuardia tower, to JFK tower, to New-york approach, and those frequencies are very busy. You will compete for time, and you will need to be smooth and appropriately-short with your conversations.
The fun had finally started. I made a left turn from Morristown, after takeoff from runway 13 I switched to Newark tower. I was told to fly over the numbers on runway 22 at 1500 feet. I trimmed the plane properly and started looking out. Rarely do you get a chance to fly over such a large airport, so low.
After passing the numbers, I was told to turn towards Verrazano bridge so I did. I flew the Corridor. Momina took some nice pictures. Maheen was mesmerized by Statue of Liberty.
Right turn to Beverly at Tappan-Zee bridge. Goodbye Morristown airport, we will never return. Good bye NJ, we will never visit without a car. And good-bye Manhattan, the magnificent.
Here are some pictures from the trip.
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| Wife flying with a touch of a first timer... both hands on |
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| Cumulonimbus |
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| Passenger shot minus kids in the back |
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| Terminals at EWR, flying at 1500 feet |
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| Large jets moving about |
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| Runways at EWR |
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| Verrazano Narrows Bridge, going South |
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| Turn back North at VZ Bridge |
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| Statue of Liberty |
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| Ground Zero. A very clear day. Flying North. |
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| Central Park |
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| Boring... Meh! in the back |
