Hi Simmers,

I want to relate a short story of flying the Boeing 767.  As a pilot for TWA before American bought us in 2001, we were able to bid to fly both domestic and international flights as our seniority would allow.  Some times I would bid to fly a month of flying to the Caribbean, especially during the winter months.  These trips were not efficient since the flight time for each leg was around 3 hours from my base in New York.  Many of the flights were just one leg to the Caribbean and then layover and fly back either the next day or sometimes we would layover for day in the Caribbean and then fly home on the third day.  So only around 6 hours flight time for three days, but each trip was like a vacation so that made up for the low flight time.

On other months I would bid flight from JFK to Cairo or Tel Aviv which built up a lot of flight time in few days at work.  So I want to tell you about a flight I flew to Cairo in the 767 ER.  The flight over to Cairo from JFK takes around 12 hours depending on the winds.  The flight leaves JFK around 10 P.M. and arrives in Cairo around 4 P.M. local time.  On these long trip we had and extra pilot so we could get a short rest period during the flight.  The westbound trip could take around 15 hours, again depending on the winds.  So this night we were preparing to leave Egypt for the U.S. and the flight time was around 15 hours and the weather in New York was not forecast to be very good.  The weather around our arrival time at 6 A.M. was forecast to be - wind 190v210 30 G 40 ceiling 200 overcast and 1/2 mile viability with rain. There was a large low pressure area moving up along the east coast and with that kind of weather we were hard pressed to find a decent alternate airport that was within our range.

One of the problems with fueling the plane in Cairo is that the fuel was delivered by fuel trucks and not pumped from under ground storage tanks.  Fuel in the ground tanks would be cooler, a lot cooler than fuel in an above ground fuel truck.  The warmer the fuel the less fuel volume you can place in the wing tanks since the fuel expands with temperature.  For this flight we needed all the fuel we could get since the weather was so bad and the available alternates were not that close.  So this evening we asked the fuller to pump as slow as possible to reduce any foaming and thus get as much as we could in the tanks.  After the fueling was complete we calculated we would have just enough to fly to JFK, make one approach and have enough fuel left to fly to the alternate and make an approach or two.

Now I've told you all this detail to relate this approach in JFK to you and show you how interesting the landing was.  We flew as efficiently as we could by flying as high as we could and trying to avoid the head winds as best as we could so we had enough fuel to make the approach in JFK.  We were cleared for the approach and given the weather as: wind 190v200 degrees at 33 gusting to 40 with ceiling of 200 feet and RVR of 1,800 feet.  So after briefing the approach and the missed approach procedure we began the ILS to RW 22L at JFK.  It was pretty bumpy as we slid down the glide slope.  Our VREF was 127 knots and it was raining pretty hard.  As we passed the 500 foot call we were getting bounced around pretty good and as we approached our minimum of 200 feet I was able to see some ground and the approach lights and sequence flashers. I said continue and as the 200 foot minimum call came I saw on the ground speed read out - 88knots! Wow! As I went into the flare I was amazed how slow we were going in relation to the ground.  We touched down and the spoilers deployed and almost immediately the F/O called out 80 knots.  I never even deployed the reverse thrust and hardly even applied any breaking to make the first turnoff.

I was very happy to have been able to make the landing and not have to go to the alternate.

Have fun flying!

Lou