Will Stephen Harper fly to China on a cargo plane from PG, or does he just say he 'supports' our airport...

Hypothetically, if he came next month we could all imprint our protests in snow messages in the surrounding farmer fields with a few themes, such as... one for when he's landing, and the other for when he's taking off....

I take a way more positive view. The Feds (and the Prov) set aside every year an amount for funding new infrastructure.

Mr. Hill (and Mr. Harris) did his job to secure a part of that total amount for partially funding the airport runway extension.

I expected him to do so. Had he not done so the money would have gone elsewhere in Canada, and believe me it would have been gladly taken and appreciated wherever that would have been.

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My dissatisfaction with the present government is focussed elsewhere and has to do with the continuing spending of (borrowed) billions to fund the never ending misadventure in Afghanistan and our continuing military involvement in that quagmire.

When will Ottawa see the light? This is one tunnel that has no light at its ending.

Now Canada has defend itself (somehow) against the accusations of knowingly handing over prisoners to certain torture and death - this being a war crime.

Say something about that, Mr. Hill!

Does anyone notice this B747 acutally flew from Sapporo Japan, to Anchorage Alaska, then to Prince George to Miami and then Caracus. Most of the so called dignataries want to ignore the fact that the plane came from Anchorage, which is the Airport that we are competing against.

Why did it go to Anchorage??? Because a B747-200F does not have the range to fly from Southeast Asia, Seoul, Sapporo, etc; to Prince George. Nor can it fly direct from Prince George to Caracas, and it had to route through Miami.

The obvious question is why would it come through Prince George at all because doing so meant an additional landing and take off. Perhaps the gung ho politicians, Airport Authority personnel etc will give us the real story some day, however at this time we are being (as usual) treated as mushrooms.

I dont have any problem with building this ifrastructure, especially if it produces some meaningful employment. My argument is and always will be against less than honest politicians, and their co-horts.

This project has been bandied around for at least five years, and the story is always changing.

It seems the business plan suggested that the airport would need approx 30 tech stops per week over a 20 year period to be a viable operation. So we have a way to go just to break even.

The task to get these planes to land here in any number is huge, and they have little incentive to do so.

I suspect that Mr. Hill, will be retired on his big pension long before we can ever call this expenditure of taxpayers money a success.

Since the Airport Authority has taken over the Airport we have had expenditures in the millions., New Terminal Expansion, New Parking Facilities, and the Runway expansion. This amounts to approx $45 Million dollars. If anyone cares to look at the Terminal Expansion you will see it has never been used except for a few trips to Mexico in the Winter. The Parking lot at any given moment has approx 300 empty spaces, which is the amount they added. The Airport Runway Expansion has just recently had One (1) plane land.

We are now in the process of building the Boundry Road extension from Hiway 16 to Hiway 97, that might be a boon to some private enterprisers, it will certainly not be any benefit to the Airport in the short term. This extension will cost taxpayers an additional $22 Million dollars.

So by the end of 2011, we will have spent over $70 Million dollars, and so far we havent created one additional job. (Other than the construction jobs)

If I recall correctly the Airpor Authority eliminated some 20 jobs when it took over the Airport, plus they just lost their communications guy to the City. So it would be fair to say that at this point we have a net loss of 21 jobs, and expenditure of $70 Million by 2011, and little of no gaurantees at this time that we have a successful project.

Have a nice day.

Palopu posted:

"Why did it go to Anchorage??? Because a B747-200F does not have the range to fly from Southeast Asia, Seoul, Sapporo, etc; to Prince George. Nor can it fly direct from Prince George to Caracas, and it had to route through Miami"
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For some reason that I believe none of us know, the last stop was Sapporo. For all I know someone had a craving to get some tempura shrimp sushi to go. That would make it a tech stop. A human need some special fuel.

Sapporo to PG is 3,500NM, making it just within the maximum distance as identified on the Boeing web site.

Why did it go to Anchorage? I thought someone said it was because their contract with Anchorage required it. Since Anchorage is 4,640NM from Caracas, there was no fueling reason to stop.

Maybe the Sushi was not enough, and they needed to pick up some deep fried King Crab.
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From Anchorage the fully loaded plane cannot make it to Caracas. It has several options of where to make a refueling stop. PG looks like it may be one of them.

PG to Caracas is 3,700NM so just out of range unless they have a smaller payload.

Anchorage to Miami is 3,450NM, also just within the range.

However, we really do not know the range to that fine a point and we do not know what margin of risk of running out of fuel they may be flying with.
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I will say it one more time. I do not think any company will consider flying into Prince George on a regular or emergency basis unless they have come here to look at the facilty. One of the easiest ways is to make a trial landing with the real thing and test it out.

There is so much secrecy in this town, it is unbelievable. And so many theories being thrown out on this site that are looking for conspiracies, deceit, etc. etc. as the primary drivers.

Gus. Southern Air Inc.'s website states that the B747-200F has a maximum payload range of 3550 statue miles. Once you reach this point you have to start reducing cargo and taking on fuel to fly further.

If we assume that this plane was loaded to the max then he could not fly to Prince George from Sapporo, nor could he fly from Anchorage to Caracus, or Anchorage to Miami.

One way of going would be to fly Sapporo to Anchorage to Pr George to Miami to Caracas. Which would be 3 stops. Another would be to fly Sapporo to Anchorage to St Louis to Caracas, which would eliminate one stop.

I guess it all depends on the maximum take off weight of the plane at time of departure, and the maximum payload range, however at the end of the day you wouldnt add an additional stop, unless it was for the reasons you mentioned.

Some of the mysteries surrounding this flight, and other information in Prince George is because of the inconsisities in reporting the facts.

The Airport Authority had three press releases on this flight on their website and they all varied. The Citzen reported that the plane took on 130,000 litres of fuel, and departed Prince George in 90 Minutes. The next day it reported a correction and stated that it took on 86000 litres of fuel and was in Prince George for 2hours and 30 Minutes, which was correct.

We have had information reported that this plane originated in Seoul Korea, Hong Kong, Sapporo, and or course Ancorage. and that it was going direct to Caracus from Prince George and that it was going to Caracas from Pr George via Miami.

At the end of the day it went from Sapporo, to Anchorage, to Prince George, to Miami, to Caracas.

There seems to be no monetary or cargo reason to land at Prince George and therefore I suspect that the Airport Authority enticed them to land here to check out the facilities, and no doubt they got a deal on the fuel, as I doubt that they would do it for free.

I guess that is what happens when the airport loses a $100,000 per year communications manager to the City. Everything goes to hell in a handbasket!!! LOL....