Hi Fly performs a ‘supersonic’ flight and breaks the Madeira-Lisbon connection record – DNOTICIAS.PT
Captain Carlos Mirpuri, assisted by Captain Ruben Morais and his entire team, recorded yesterday a record flight time between Madeira and Lisbon, aboard an Airbus from the Hi Fly company. This certification marks two members in the representation of the FAI (World Air Sports Federation) of one board, who agreed that the flight time was 70 minutes (one hour and 10 minutes).
The information was revealed by the airline, using an aircraft A330-900neo, registration CS-TKY, which traveled a distance of 565 nautical kilometers.
Carlos Mirpuri commented that “achieving record flying time on this route requires a set of conditions that combine. This means strong southwestern tail winds on the way and northeasterly winds in Lisbon. It is also convenient to leave runway 05 in Madeira, which is normally unfeasible with southwesterly winds, and land on runway 03 in Lisbon. Today we found a reasonable tail wind, far from ideal, and we were forced to use lane 23 in Madeira, and lane 21 in Lisbon, which means the worst possible combination”.
And continuous: “But against all odds and with good support from Air Traffic Control, it still manages to cover as much as 565 nautical kilometers of this route in a record time of 70 minutes, which now becomes an official mark in the presence of the FAI judges. ”
It is said that choosing “a cruise flight level offering the highest TAS (true air speed) and the proper descent initiation and deceleration point played an important factor”, so, in addition, “a positive ISA deviation requires us to reach an actual speed of 500 knots. During much of the cruise, there were tailwinds averaging 35 knots”.
It is recalled that, previously, “Commander Mirpuri reached the same route 64 minutes with an A320 and 59 minutes with an A330”, but at the time he had a “good choice of runways and better tailwinds”. However, “these times were not observed by the FAI judges, as they were not planned, but removed from the existing environmental conditions on the day”, explains Hi Fly.
The captain also adds that “70 minutes of shooting with this track combination is an incredible pace”, which now becomes official. “Normally, the distance between Madeira and Lisbon is made by commercial aircraft in a flight time of 75 to 80 minutes for a 03/05 runway configuration and 85 to 90 minutes for a 23/21 runway configuration”, he explains.
A note concludes with an interesting fact, which is that Commander Mirpuri also holds the record for the maximum number of passengers leaving Madeira for Lisbon. With an A330-300 in high density configuration, the impressive number of souls in an onboard era of 410. ”