DECEMBER 2004 FLIGHT OF THE MONTH
By
Alejandro Irausquin
Welcome to this month flight! I must confess
that being a simmer that rarely loads his flights outside his country and with
my now very restricted desktop flying time, it was a real challenge to come up
with something for you all to enjoy.
From the start I set some goals for this
flight:
-
The flights location would be dictated by the previous FOTM,
-
No more than three flights, better if single leg ones, whit a task to
perform
-
No need to download any add-on scenery, flight plans, etc.
-
Outside Venezuela, but still “at home”.
-
Possible waypoints for a future RTW flight on my own.
A quick look at the FS Navigator map centered
at the last FOTM final location brought to my attention some islands in the
south pacific west to the south American coast. These islands do belong to south
American countries despite their far location from terra firma. And their names
were even familiar to me! And I am quite sure they are familiar to you to. A
nice geography (and literature?) class, in the club best tradition. You will
visiting the islands Isla de Pascua (Chile), Robinson Crusoe (Chile) and Islas
de los Galapagos (Ecuador). The challenge comes in the form of some “rally
style” tasks.
It was fun to learn from Tony Radmilovich 4th
RTW flight that one of the locations you will be visiting is in fact one
waypoint in his route. So for those of you performing RTW flights, you may wish
to reach that location first, and then report that portion of the FOTM as part
of your flight.
I am not precisely the kind of “take-off
from here, land there” flyer, but the kind that takes a plane and explore the
surroundings . I don’t expect you to take-off from your home airport, land
here and then perform the tasks. Just start your flight at the flight location
and go ahead! Anyway, as always, you have the final decision.
So lets go in detail on each flight:
Known as “Rapa Nui” this island is
located 3200 km from the Chilean coast, and it is considered
a national park. Its highest point is Cerro Terevaka (600 m). An
interesting note, its population is of Polynesian origin. The only airport is
located at Matavari (Pic 1)
The most notorious feature of the island are
the stone giants (Mooais, up to 10m in height) sculpted from volcanic
stone, and grouped in rows. It is not known who made them, what they represent
and how they were placed at their location (Pic 2). Some have lost their support
and fallen on one side (Pic 3). I remember watching this images for the fist
time in a Jacques Costeau documentary.
Your task for this flight is to find the
major number of statues locations. They are all around the island! Here is a
hint: Fly near the roads, both the ones going inland and the ones going around
the beaches. Even watch the airport area closely. By the way, the round stuff is
a VOR station, not an OVNI (you already know that, of course…)
You will take off from Mataveri Intl (SCIP).
Use the runway of your choice. Go around as many times you wish. An FS Nav map
screenshot showing the giant heads locations as fixes would be a nice thing to
see!
For this flight I used a highly modified FS
C182RG model I hope to make available for all you very soon, which is the result
of several people work. It features a fully working 3D cockpit (VC) and it is
fitted with the wonderful FS2K DF2000 C182RG panel put to work with FS2002, and
great classic repaint. I did put everything together and created the matching VC
panel and bitmaps. An FSFC repaint you ask? Tony!!!
An island named “Robinson Crusoe”??? It
really does exist? In south America? What a finding!
Robinson Crusoe island, previously known as
“Más a Tierra” (nearer to land) is one of the islands that form Chile’s
Juan Fernandez archipelago. The island terrain is mountainous, reaching
915m at “Cerro Yunque”. The second, smaller island, is named after Alexander
Selkirk, the man which history inspired Daniel Dafoe to write “Life and
Extra Ordinaries and Portentous
Adventures of Robinson Crusoe” (1719, title translated from Spanish). The
island was previously named “Más Lejos” (farther away).
So what will you be doing at this isolate
island? Well, practicing your deck landing skills acquired from the previous
aircraft carrier FOTM. Your task is to land at the runway numbers, from any side
(Pic 5). Report your best shot! If in the process you go around the island, you
even my find what may looks like Robinson itself standing there (Pic 6). You
have up to 3 chances for an touch and go or a go around (Pic 7). Your
airport name is Robinson Crusoe (SCIR), which belongs to an aero naval
station. To be honest, I need to go back and do that carrier landing FOTM, as I
didn’t did well this time (Pic 8).
It is interesting to lean that Selkirk, an
Scottish sailor, lived alone in “Más a tierra” for four years (1704-1709).
As a fun side note, while researching this FOTM, I finally had the chance to see
Tom Hanks in “Castaway”. Another fun note, our friend Tony Radmilovich and
me exchange some emails days ago about Bill Smith being part of a reality show.
“Survivor” was an example brought by Tony. It happens that our own version
of this show is called “Robinson, the adventure”.
Airplane used by me is the Rutan LongEz
Millennium Flight by Oliver Merechal - Designair (www.perso.wanadoo.fr/designair).
It is the plane I plan to modify/use for my very first RTW flight. If you get
the plane, be sure to get the patch too. It even includes some gauges customized
by me for this particular plane!
Your final loction for this FOTM is Islas de
los Galapagos (Giant tortoise´s island). Altough pretty far to the north from
Isla de Pascua and Robinson Crusoe, I included these islands due to my old
interest on the biodiversity of this national park, declared as an world natural
good by UNESCO in 1978. The islands are located 1000 km west from Ecuador´s
coasts. It was visited by Darwin in 1835, helping him to dictate his evolution
theory. 250 of the 900 vegetal species present are unique to the islands.
Main islands are
Santa Cruz, San Cristobal, Santa Maria, Isabela and Baltra. The
Intercontinental airport, Seymour (SEGS) is located at Baltra. Other airports
are located at San Cristobal (SEST) and Puerto Villamil (Z09H).
The islands origin is volcanic, and the
activity persist until today on some of the 2000 craters sparsed in the slands.
While suveying the islands by air (Pic 9), I found one of those (a big one)(Pic
10). A great sight it is.
Your task for this flight is to find that
crater. Take off from either SEGS or Z09H. Concentrate your search on the 5
bigger islands in the west group. Take a look at the volcano mouth (Pic 11) and
then return to the nearest airport (Pic 12). If you have FS Nav and are corious
enough, you can find a hint on the crater loction.
Airplane
used for this flight is the Flight1 Cessna 421C, a great product despite its
age. It sport two similar paint schemes availables at Flightsim.com and modified
by me as Island Charters “Alejandro Jose” (YV-1606CP) and “Mildreana del Carmen” (YV-0103CP). The VC pic shows the
OV-10A Bronco from Tim Conrad, with my still unfinnished Panel and VC update.
I
hope you have enjoyed this flights. I promise that my next FOTM will not be
about islands. Let’s wait what will brought us the New Year. Merry
Christmas!!!
Alejandro
Irausquín
Some
useful airport data:
Airport
SCIP
Full
name:
Mataveri Intl
City:
Isla De Pascua
Country:
Chile
Ground
Frequency: 121.90
MHz
Tower
Frequency:
118.10 MHz
Center
Frequency:
118.10 MHz 127.30 MHz
Altitude:
226 ft
Mag.
Variation: -15.1 deg
Lat/Lon:
S27°09.58'
W109°25.77'
Rwy
ILS/GS/DME 10
IIPA
Airport:
Mataveri Intl
ILS
Frequ./Range:
110.30 MHz 27 nm
Approach
course:
102 deg
Glideslope
altitude:
1600 ft at 5 nm distance
Altitude/Surface:
226 ft Asphalt
Length/Width:
10841 ft 148 ft
Lat/Lon:
S27°09.49'
W109°26.18'
Airport
SCIR
Full
name:
Robinson Crusoe
City:
Robinson Crusoe
Country:
Chile
Altitude:
465 ft
Mag.
Variation: -12.1 deg
Lat/Lon:
S33°40.00'
W078°59.00'
Runway
14
Airport:
Robinson Crusoe
Approach
course:
148 deg
Altitude/Surface:
465 ft Asphalt
Length/Width:
2822 ft 59 ft
Lat/Lon:
S33°39.80'
W078°59.10'
Airport
SEGS
Full
name:
Seymour
City:
Baltra I Galapagos Is
Country:
Ecuador
Tower
Frequency:
122.20 MHz
Altitude:
49 ft
Mag.
Variation: -6.3 deg
Lat/Lon:
S00°27.15'
W090°15.87'
Runway
14
Airport:
Seymour
Approach
course:
136 deg
Altitude/Surface:
49 ft Asphalt
Length/Width:
7803 ft 115 ft
Lat/Lon:
S00°27.46'
W090°15.66'
Airport
Z09H
Full
name:
Puerto Villamil
City: Puerto Villamil
Country:
Ecuador
Altitude:
98 ft
Mag.
Variation: -6.8 deg
Lat/Lon:
S00°56.62'
W090°57.20'
Runway 16
Airport: Puerto Villamil
Approach
course:
164 deg
Altitude/Surface:
98 ft Asphalt
Length/Width:
4943 ft 102 ft
Lat/Lon:
S00°56.24'
W090°57.26'