Normandy, Auschwitz, & Prague + icing encounter

I just completed a long-awaited brief tour of a couple key WW2 sites with my father, who came from the US to make the trip. We had been talking about it for a while, and the stars finally aligned to make it happen. Ultimately we decided on arguably two of the most important sites of the European war, the landing beaches in Normandy and Auschwitz. Since Prague sits on the route from Rotterdam to Auschwitz, we decided to spend one night there on the way back. The trip was a great success, and I highly recommend all three as flying destinations.

For the Normandy part of the trip I chose Caen (LFRK) due to its proximity to the landing beaches. There are several solid choices in the region, but this seemed most convenient. It’s PPR, which was quickly granted, and has rental cars on site, which we definitely needed in order to see the sites in the area. I filed IFR both directions, with a couple amendments due to our own failure to get moving in the morning, and each time got a CTOT 10 mins after the filed time. This was amusing since there was literally no traffic at the field when we were there.

In the two days in the region we visited Utah and Gold beaches, as well as a few of the bunkers, the British memorial, and the excellent Overlord Museum. There’s so much to see there that you could spend days visiting everything, but we were satisfied with what we were able to see.

We had some beautiful rainbows and sunset views on the flight back to Rotterdam:

The next day we got up early for the flight to Kaniow (EPKW), which is about 35 minutes from Auschwitz. We had a 16:30 time slot for our Auschwitz visit, and wanted to have plenty of time to deal with logistics before rushing to the memorial. We could have made the 4.5 hour trip nonstop, but my personal limit is about 3.5 hours before I want to take care of basic human needs. So we planned a stop about halfway in Erfut (EDDE).

The forecast called for low level overcast to broken clouds most of the route, and the METAR at EHRD on departure reported two layers below the 5000’ freezing level (one at a few hundred feet and another at 2500, which I expected to rapidly improve moving inland. I had seen this with my own eyes on the way to the field. Normally you get routed to the southeast from Rotterdam to avoid Schiphol traffic, but this time we were routed directly east into the thickest cloud. I had been given an altitude of FL050, and expected to break out before then. As we approached FL050 it was clear we weren’t breaking out, so I requested a further climb to FL060 and a routing to the south to avoid icing.

At this point I noticed two things simultaneously: 1) rime ice began collecting on the leading edges; and 2) climb performance degrading. We still weren’t on top approaching FL060, so I requested a further climb to FL070 and reminded ATC of my icing and need to divert south. They quickly responded, and I managed to very slowly reach FL070, where finally we saw the sun. After a few minutes the thick cloud was behind us and we had only the forecasted and reported lower deck below for the remainder of the flight. Fortunately I was cognizant of the risk, knew my escape route, and reacted quickly to avoid making the situation worse, but I was astonished how quickly the ice built up and degraded aircraft performance in such a short period of time. And also surprised that it took nearly the remainder of the ~2 hr flight to lose the ice we accumulated. You really can’t waste any time when it comes to ice!

Fortunately even with carrying a bit of rime on the leading edges the remainder of the flight was uneventful—if a bit slower than planned due to the degraded performance. The fuel stop in Erfut was quick and easy, and will probably be a destination at some point. It seems a very picturesque area worth visiting. The second leg to Kaniow was uneventful, and we descended quickly through the shallow cloud deck and canceled IFR about 10 minutes out for a VFR arrival. Kaniow is a bit in the middle of nowhere, but it’s the closest to Auschwitz and has Avgas—though everything was cash only. We got help from a local pilot in ordering a taxi for the 35 minute drive into the city.

After dropping our bags at the hotel, we got another taxi for the 10 minute drive to the Auschwitz memorial site. The camp itself is a sobering reminder of how low humanity can go, and I recommend visiting if you ever have the opportunity. It was an unpleasant but important experience, and quite different experiencing it in person compared to photos and films. Especially standing in the gas chamber gave me such an overwhelming sensation that’s hard to describe, and seeing the furnaces right next door designed to make the whole operation efficient. A really intense experience!

The next morning we planned to fly to Prague and land at Vodochody (LKVO), which is a private field with limited weekday hours, but it’s paved and reasonably located for visiting the city. Unfortunately I’d not yet received a response to my PPR, and called the tower to learn that they were short-staffed and couldn’t approve it. I reluctantly changed my plan to go to Letnany (LKLT) instead, which is conveniently located but with parallel grass runways that everyone reported to be in quite poor condition. I’d just cleaned the airplane and really didn’t want to get it dirty, but ultimately gave in and decided to go for it.

We flew VFR for the 1.5 hr trip over the mountains, which were covered with cloud for most of the trip. The airspace around Letnany is very complex and the procedures daunting, as it sits under the Praha TMA and shares airspace with Kbely military base. Just trying to understand exactly what you’re supposed to do isn’t easy, and I don’t intimidate easily. But I just called Kbely and asked to transition, which they granted, and then simultaneously spoke with Kbely and Letnany to coordinate a right hand downwind to 05, which literally has you flying right over the top of the air base on downwind. I chose 05L after watching another pilot depart from there, and it was definitely the worst runway I’d ever landed on at that point. However they were ready for us at the fuel pump and the service was excellent.

We took a taxi to our hotel, and had a nice day exploring one of the world’s most beautiful cities.

The next morning we woke up to severe clear for the entire route, and I decided last minute to fly VFR instead of IFR. We had an uneventful 3 hour trip back to Rotterdam with smiles on our faces.