A day (and flight) to remember

On Saturday, 10th October, a group of enthusiasts arrived at Lanseria airport, near Johannesburg, South Africa to check in for the flight of a lifetime. The destination was Maun in Botswana but honestly it could have flown anywhere and we'd have gone. The aircraft in question was Gulfstream G-1159A Gulfstream 3
ZS-VIP (con 444) operated by Zenith Air. I first saw this at Gatwick in 1985 as N110MT. See pic - click here
We were airborne off runway 07 at 0814 and climbed to FL400 in 16 minutes. We landed on 08 at Maun at 0925, 1 hour and 11 minutes later. I also did the return leg. Some of the group flew in a Cessna 401 which took a bit longer. We were airborne at 1403 climbing to FL450 in 18 minutes and returned home at 1511, 1 hour and 8 minutes later. See the video
Thanks to Michael Flebbe for all the organisation.



>> A few more pictures can be seen here <<