Flight 43: Goose Bay to Iqaluit

Cirrus VLJ at Goose Bay

I got tired of fighting the FSD Pilatus Porter, so I switched to another plane from FSD:  the Cirrus VLJ.  It is quite a change of pace.  In the picture above it is parked outside of the tower at Goose Bay.

It was still snowing outside and the airport was only allowing IFR flights.  I got clearance and headed out to Iqaluit.

Iqaluit (Inuktitut: ᐃᖃᓗᐃᑦ; [iqaːluit]) is the largest city and territorial capital of the Canadian territory of Nunavut. It was officially called Frobisher Bay until 1987, after the name of the bay on whose shore it is sited. Iqaluit is located on the south coast of Baffin Island at the head of Frobisher Bay. As of the 2011 census the population was 6,699, an increase of 8.3 percent from the 2006 census; it has the lowest population of any capital city in Canada.  Inhabitants of Iqaluit are called Iqalummiut (singular: Iqalummiuq).

Iqaluit is the smallest Canadian capital in terms of population and the only capital that is not connected to other settlements by a highway. Located on an island remote from the Canadian highway system, Iqaluit is generally only accessible by aircraft and, subject to ice conditions, by boat. Iqaluit Airport is a fully modern facility whose originally Second World War era runway is more than long enough for most classes of modern jet. Plans are underway to build a new, larger passenger terminal building north of the current terminal, which would also include a larger apron adjacent to the new terminal.

Iqaluit Airport (IATA: YFB, ICAO: CYFB) serves Iqaluit, Nunavut, Canada and is located adjacent to the town. It is operated by the government of Nunavut. It hosts scheduled passenger service from Ottawa, Montreal, Rankin Inlet and Kuujjuaq on carriers such as First Air and Canadian North, and from smaller communities throughout eastern Nunavut. It is also used as a forward operating base by the CF-18 Hornet. In 2011, the terminal handled more than 120,000 passengers

Cirrus VLJ at Iqaluik

It was a long and uneventful flight.  Except that I really had not figured out how to work the G1000 which came with the Cirrus.  ATC, however, vectored me in, so I really did not need all of the approach capabilities of the G1000.