There are two Congo’s in Africa, the Democratic Republic of Congo and, the Republic of Congo that has Brazzaville as its capital.

West Africa in general is not really a good place to take high value personal belongings like digital SLR’s, Laptop computers, Ipod’s and such like. Items like this attract the attention of Immigration Staff who demand that an “Import” certificate be produced. No “import” certificate is slightly problematic: But it can be resolved by a $20 gratuity which oils the wheels of officialdom and gets an entry visa for “expensive personal belonging”

The republic of Congo is also the home of The Worlds most terrifying airline….Trans Air Congo (Plummet Airlines), of which I had the experience of flying with.

Trans Air Congo flies into Pointe Noire from Brazzaville. It also flies into mountains, housing developments and various forms of solids and fluids when Sir Isaac Newton’s first 2 laws of gravity can no longer apply…..or is it computes?

I was working offshore in the Republic of Congo approximately 10 nautical miles south of the Ponte Noire, the Republic’s second city off the small town of Djeno. We were laying a pipeline out from the processing plant to an offshore loading buoy for shuttle tankers to moor up to and upload a cargo of oil.

Not many photographs worthy of note, other than to say that for the amateur meteorologists amongst you, there was this “front” that rolled overhead at quite a speed. I have never seen anything like it before, and it was quite a spectacular sight that unfortunately the pictures cannot do justice to.