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What's involved in this? Anyone had any experience?

I knew a guy South of here who had a fish place on the Tweed river, and found a market for selling mullet (Generally rejected as a 'cheap' and nasty table fish here) in Paris back in the 80's....the Parisians could not get enough of them back then. Though what he was selling were dead, gutted ?., and put on ice.

Curious as to what's involved in air transporting live fish? Pure whimsical, but was looking to fly around some 'guppy' sized fish in a RC 'Cargo' model for the fun of it, that's all...

Plastic bags of fish, half full of water, squirt of O2 in the bag to aerate and tied off then packed in coolers to prevent movement and protect the bags was the way we moved small marine types back when the earth was flat and dinosaurs roamed free. Might have some DG issues with salt water and O2 though.

As for mullet, salted and wind dried they make reasonable jerky, known as bokkems in the Cape. Used to get a couple of big ones with a throw net and smoke them, delicate flesh and not a bad flavour, although they're bony as fook.

A friend's brother's first job as a pilot involved, amongst other things, flying live eels out to the Far East from EMA I think. We laughed at the thought of trying to strap all those slippery eels into their seats!

Not flying live fish but lively fish flying...

Back in the Cold War,we detached to the Outer Hebrides at intervals. Broken jets (normally avionics/radar snags) would need to be replaced with fresh ones from home plate.
Routine: 1700 - fresh jet ordered by detachment.
1900 Fish order from home plate sent to detachment ops.
0400 Duty Sergeant takes the Landie down to the fish dock to start filling the order.
0530 Fresh jet takes off from home plate - low level wazex up the glens.
0600 ammo bay of broken jet is filled with fish order
0615 fresh jet crew jumps out of fresh jet into broken jet.Hold the nose down till 600 kts then climb vertically to 30,000+. Back to home plate direct at M0.99*
0730 kippers for breakfast back at home plate, rest of fish in perfect condition.

*p.s.It is absolutely vital that the guys bringing the champers back from the Rheims detachment (to go with the lobster) do NOT do this. Anything over 18,000 ft and the corks start popping. Procedure was basically reversed for champers - low level home.

Have strong recollection of Vulcan returning from Goose after pre-Christmas nav exercise with bomb bay panniers full of salmon, and I mean full. Needless to say the panniers, both, were rapidly removed to the Officers Mess. All the guys who got to unload it was a smell.

Alison

Very poor show - everybody involved in our fish operation got their order. Goodwill is more valuable than rubies.

...and everybody keeps SCHTUM - about this and everything else. Not that there was anything else,obviously...

Great stories, dear friends....but my aim right now is trying to fly live fish via a RC model.....some considerable CofG issues here in such a small aircraft...

Can't see that doing the fish much good.

It might be okay if they were members of the Exocoetidae family, aka as flying fish. Just need to keep them on a leash so they don't cause any disruption to other users.

Alison

Never got to fly any live fish about the countryside in my PNG days but one time I took a large number of day old chickens, all in cartons which completely filled the C402, from Port Moresby to (I think) Mt Hagen.

The heat coming off them made the interior of the aircraft so hot that sweat was pouring off me, even at 16,000`. And you could hear their cheeping, even over the sound of the engines.

Another odd cargo was 260 young live Saltwater Crocodiles, all in separate cardboard containers and each with a very stout rubber band holding their jaws closed.

12 corgis. And, one went missing. Found the little pup asleep under a seat.

Not sure a crocodile counts but a mate was getting eggs from a croc nest one day, helicopter pilot landed nearby to wait.
Mother croc decided to try to jump into the passenger side of the helicopter. I gather from the story it was a rather rapid lift off - and probably a brown trouser moment for the pilot

So, actually there are some advantages to living in the old 'urope?

It might be okay if they were members of the Exocoetidae family, aka as flying fish. Just need to keep them on a leash so they don't cause any disruption to other users.

Strap one to each wing for a twin?

I worked for a stone redneck for a little while, out in the far western end of Virginia, coal country. That coal was mined by paid-up hillbillies who all seemed to be married to their cousins and, in Richlands at least, they all drove Fords, when my boss was the Ford dealer.

My boss had a club, and he had promised all the members a seafood dinner with fresh lobster, except that Piedmont Airlines, the "Trailways of the Air," had screwed up and sent the lobsters walkabout. When they were finally corralled I was sent to pick them up over at Tri-Cities Airport in Tennessee, using a shiny-new V35B Beech Bonanza. That was our little runabout when we did not want to use the new King Air F90. Livin' high, livin' high, doncha' know.

I had visions of scaly crustaceans crawling up my back, worse than the scaly Columbian drug smugglers I had been hauling in and out of South Florida, but all I got were four or five cardboard boxes with little rustling noises coming from within, so no drama at all ensued.

Since I was not a paid-up member of the local redneck elite that was as close as I got to fresh lobster that day. My seafood dinner was a can of soup, Campbell's Chunky Manhattan-style Clam Chowder, washed down with Pabst Blue Ribbon beer, I seem to recall.

but one time I took a large number of day old chickens

We used to fly day old chicks from Bournemouth to Valencia in Dart Heralds, the max diff of 2.2 PSI could never be achieved, and having to climb over the hills en route used to cause a high fatality rate amongst the passengers.
I used to have a bin bag full of wet rags, and as we climbed I used to caulk the door gaps with these rags to seal the gaps to try and keep some sort of differential.
Home leg used to be exhaust pipes for Ford to Speke or Cologne, no problems with this, so was able to kip on pallets of exhaust pipes on the way back.

Day-old chicks have been known to 'cook' if packed too tightly, poor buggers. Sadly, not too much meat on them..............