591st fly-in: Rothera Station, Antarctica (EGAR/AT01)

[Kumiankka]

link to fly-in index thread

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With fly-in day approaching again this Sunday, April 24th, we've once again had a ton of great suggestions from all of you. Unfortunately those will all have to wait until later, as due to some busy work schedules on my part, this weekend's destination has already been set in stone. Or rather, ice, as the airfield in question is none other than Rothera Research Station, Antarctica, going by the ICAO codes of EGAR (in real life) and AT01 (in X-Plane). The single unpaved runway of about 3000 ft will be a little more challenging than our past few fly-ins, but can be safely used by Twin Otter and Dash 7 aircraft, the latter of which connect the station to the rest of the world through the Falkland Islands. Our first visit to this remote destination, and our second one to Antarctica altogether, is made possible by the recent release of the first part of the Antarctica4XPlane scenery. Make sure to install both the Antarctica4XPlane package and the airport scenery linked below - for Antarctica there is no default X-Plane mesh!

Have fun, and please consider donating to support the X-Flightserver.net team with their server maintenance costs.

 

 

New pilots are always welcome, read the threads linked here to get started:

How to get started flying online
Fly-in guidelines

[Skylark2992]

Brrr...indeed, icy cold! I reckon that the Mitsubishi MU-2 will be my mode of transport this time. Other local sceneries can be found here as departure points. I say local, but the distance from the furthest airport (SAYE) to EGAR is approximately 350nm!

This will be totally different for me (probably for most), so good choice Kumiankka! The pre-flight checklist starts now: gloves - check; shovel - check; de-icer - check...

EDIT: I just visited AT01/EGAR with real weather: it was horrendous! 39kt cross-wind, heavy rain, and freezing fog.

...map - check; spare tyre - check; emergency flare - check!

[Coolbub123]

Nice Location indeed! I'll be starting from Esperanza Base. In either DC-3 or C90B King Air, or a C17 Globemaster III...

[ghun1]

Interesting destination, with some recent stories of other places in Antarctica visited by aircraft. Boeing recently put a 757 down on a blue ice runway at Union Glacier http://mashable.com/2015/11/27/antarctica-flights/#Tpp3Z2zCdmq8

It has 62 business class seats, so a nice way to travel. Other flights have been military including the obvious C-130 but also now the C-17 and Il-76 (to McMurdo) http://blogs.crikey.com.au/planetalking/2015/11/22/australia-joins-antarcticas-heavy-jet-club-at-last/

and also an Airbus A319 has joined in the blue ice runway landings flying a Hobart, Australia to Antarctica return route without refueling. http://www.antarctica.gov.au/living-and-working/travel-and-logistics/aviation/intercontinental-operations/a319-background-information

No idea where these other runways and locations are but almost certainly not on x-plane until more are released? Eager to try it out (and I think given the long distances over water I will pack the warp drive equipped FMS).

 

[Rat-7]

I can not get a flight plan from EGYP to EGAR or SAWB

[Skylark2992]

@ ghun1: Thank you for the links, very interesting reads!

1 hour ago, Rat-7 said:

I can not get a flight plan from EGYP to EGAR or SAWB

Yeah, I find that flight planners do not recognize EGAR/AT01 and some other airfields. Skyvector has good charts, but only to a point; beyond that, it's VFR and good pilot judgment! 

I am having a massive problem: I am really struggling to fly the MU-2. I haven't flown it regularly since 1.5 years ago, and even replicating previous settings for stability augmentation and joystick dead-zones is having no effect; I can only describe my flights as being like one ball rolling on top of another ball whilst being bounced along a seesaw! I may revert to v1.6 to see if the aircraft becomes more or less flyable. Probably, it is just poor piloting - in the real-world, the MU-2 carries a special type rating for this and other reasons. To some, it's a chocolate teapot, but I am determined to fly this beauty!

[cyl8]

i am hoping to fly from Ushuaia but the only scenery i could find needs to be converted from fsx format or so ( and we couldn't get fs2xplane to work on mac last round ). Would anyone help me convert this?  I found this from a pretty awesome Argentine flight sim site  Thanks much!

http://www.flightsimulatorarg.com.ar/xescenarios11.htm

Under the "Tierra del Fuego para FSX" section

[Coolbub123]

Change of plan, I might fly the IXEG 733 from a further location

[ghun1]

16 hours ago, Skylark2992 said:

@ ghun1: Thank you for the links, very interesting reads!

Yeah, I find that flight planners do not recognize EGAR/AT01 and some other airfields. Skyvector has good charts, but only to a point; beyond that, it's VFR and good pilot judgment! 

I am having a massive problem: I am really struggling to fly the MU-2. I haven't flown it regularly since 1.5 years ago, and even replicating previous settings for stability augmentation and joystick dead-zones is having no effect; I can only describe my flights as being like one ball rolling on top of another ball whilst being bounced along a seesaw! I may revert to v1.6 to see if the aircraft becomes more or less flyable. Probably, it is just poor piloting - in the real-world, the MU-2 carries a special type rating for this and other reasons. To some, it's a chocolate teapot, but I am determined to fly this beauty!

Are you using the latest version of the Mu-2? If not try downloading the latest. Works for me in XP 1045.

[ghun1]

18 hours ago, Rat-7 said:

I can not get a flight plan from EGYP to EGAR or SAWB

You could make a flight plan as far south as you can possibly fly using skyvector (it has SCRM and further South VOR Marambio, MBI) or whatever, then add some waypoints using a standard X-Plane fms or the lat/lon intersection waypoints like 6668W. That should get you close. The standard XP FMS should have the other airfields you've installed available too. 

[Rat-7]

Skyvector, I can not make it work, I use onlineflightplanner.org, since this one can save flight plan in a useable format for X-Plane

I tried to get a flight plan from EGYP to SAWB, but for some reason there some thing that is missing to create the flight plan :-(

As for adding waypoint, I have no clue on how to do that, and I have never used an FMC

[Skylark2992]

26 minutes ago, ghun1 said:

Are you using the latest version of the Mu-2? If not try downloading the latest. Works for me in XP 1045.

Yeah, I downloaded the latest and recent update to v1.7; however, as I say, it is highly likely that I just need to practice. It took me about 2 months to develop good motor skills to operate it when I first flew it 1.5 years ago. (I emphasize motor skills because it really is a tough aircraft to fly, in a realistic way according to real-world MU-2 pilots.) I am also accustomed to fly-by-wire aircraft, such as the Eclipse-550 and the Sukhoi Superjet, whereas the MU-2 is a so-called old-school aircraft.

I tried v1.6 and I had similar results but slightly better handling - I attribute that to a slight improvement in my flying skills over the last two days. I am using 100% stability augmentation and 50% linearity of controls, in case they clarify my situation.

With v1.7 of the MU-2, the annunciators do not work for me, despite following the checklist exactly. For example, I could not perform the Single Red Line (SRL) check, as the annunciators did not illuminate. They did not illuminate when I pressed the test-all button too. I also found that I experienced a heavy frame-rate loss with v1.7 under identical testing conditions.

Anyway, tomorrow will be interesting to say the very least!

46 minutes ago, coolbub123 said:

Change of plan, I might fly the IXEG 733 from a further location

The 733 = the 737-300? I think. Anyway, you can land a 737 at EGAR/AT01?! With skis or without?

[Coolbub123]

1 hour ago, Skylark2992 said:

The 733 = the 737-300? I think. Anyway, you can land a 737 at EGAR/AT01?! With skis or without?

If it has good brakes then it's fine I'm just testing it's physics right now at TNCM. and yes 733 = 737-300

[ghun1]

I just found the British Antarctic Survey Information for Pilots, and more specifically the Rothera approach plates.

Clearly shows a co-located DME (117.25 ROT) and NDB (310 ROT) right on the threshold to RWY 36. So get editing in X-Plane....

pim_ch7_chartsal3_rothera_010113.pdf

 

Gary

[surfintucson]

xFlightPlanner.net shows the airfield but no fixes nearby. You could enter GPS points along the route there. I'm going to try to do that before tomorrow.
--Mike

 

[Rat-7]

I made it to EGYP at 04:30GMT, I will see what I can do from there for the fly-in

[maps2xplane]

On 21. April 2016 at 10:14 AM, ghun1 said:

but almost certainly not on x-plane until more are released?

We're working hard on it and Antarctica4XPlane Part 2 is ready to release. This second part of our Antarctica Mesh covers the Victoria Land including - amongst others - the runways around McMurdo Station and Scott Base: NZIR, NZPG and NZWD... See you there.

[durian]

3 hours ago, Rat-7 said:

I made it to EGYP at 04:30GMT, I will see what I can do from there for the fly-in

I saw you there , I was flying the Catalina from SAYE to Rothera, but crashed on the way Not sure I have time later today,

-peter

[Kumiankka]

Going to be a bit busy today so no long hauls for me this time, might be running a little late too but I'll try to make it to start from Palmer Station (NZ12) at some time during the evening.

[Skylark2992]

20 hours ago, coolbub123 said:

If it has good brakes then it's fine I'm just testing it's physics right now at TNCM. and yes 733 = 737-300

Cool, good luck with that! (Thanks, the name had me confused.)

@ghun1: Thank you for the chart and the navaids - I will add them now, as best I can. These sceneries are beautiful!

[Rat-7]

I am on my way to Rothera, I should be there around 15:00GMT

I forgot that you can create a direct flight in the GPS and save it

[surfintucson]

WOW, what a fantastic destination for today's fly-in: Antarctica. Nice pick KUMIANKKA. And just stunning, amazing work by the maps2xplane team!! Thank you Matthias, Nino and Paolo. This scenery package has truly opened a new and amazing world to fly in. When the sun was visible it was odd for me to think of that as north (fly 360 into the sun?)--I need to fly in the southern hemisphere more often. 

My new rig has also opened some new opportunities for my own X-Plane flying thanks to framerates that are great: namely being able to fly in lots of clouds and trying some new airplanes. That latter a good change--when all I had was the old 777 Speedbird some of these fly-in were a little extra challenging. This week I left the777 back at the KTUS hanger. I picked up a C130H (Bob439's) and had a quick paint put on it before the ferry flight down to Antarctica.

Knowing I'd be starting later than many pilots due to home timezones, I started the day at SAWZ-Matienzo Base for a 300nm or so flight to AT01/EGAR-Rothera Research Station.

I like this C130 because it has short-field capabilities but also because it uses the same FMC as my 777; I still haven't figured out the Garmin unit in the Twin Otter. There had been some discussion earlier in the week about the lack of charts and navaids and such in the south polar region. I programmed a course to take me via Palmer Station so my descent would be mostly over water. I was happy with that choice later when I was descending with zero visibility. Others started from farther away (Falklands appearing a popular choice) and chose various flight routes into Rothera. I bet the x-flightserver doesn't see activity here too often:

The climb-out from SAWZ was smooth:

Up to FL170 for awhile, crossing the Antarctic Peninsula with time to enjoy the great scenery:

Many pilots chose smaller, slower, sturdier aircraft this week--several Twin Otters, C130s and DC3s.Those coming in from Argentina or the Falklands had a bit of open water to cross. Even in this remote and large landscape, we managed to have a busy day. Several pilots (NICO, COOLBUB, SL2992, RAJO and RAFISH all arriving at the same time, necessitating some holding patterns for landing at Rothera runway 36:

(BTW, it seemed the stock X-Plane real-world weather was considerably different than that provided by the NOAA plug-in. Different enough to indicate different active runways. Thoughts for future fly-ins?)

I started my descent well out from field, down through some soup and then under a thick layer at about 2000 feet:

With Rothera in sight at about 1500 feet I did a fly-over to set up for a rw36 landing:

By the time I'd gotten configured and on final some fog was closing in. What are the minimums down there? This developed late on my approach (after I'd visually aligned); later in the day I would have significantly more trouble:

Managed to get it down and parked. View of the field from the hill:

Then the entertainment began. Icy, very slippery conditions on the ground: hard to taxi even. And, of course, depending on the aircraft and whatnot, hard to stop on the short strip. Here's COOLBUB behind my C130 doing one of my favorite maneuvers: trying to put a 777 down anywhere:

We need more helo pilots on these fly-ins. Why? Rescue operations! A series of over-runs ensued. Who was flying this Eclipse?

Here's GHUN1 bringing in a big transport (what is that, a C17?):

Presuming reverse thrust and tender braking on the run-out:

But not enough. Note the helo (XPCYL8?) to the aft flying rescue:

While that plane floated away, more followed:

Meanwhile, I'd looked for a helo taxi out to the aircraft carrier Nimitz (but the carrier does not seem to place itself the same for everyone). I found a ride and needed to get my Twin Otter off her deck and back to land.

With the airspeed indicator reading 40 knots with brakes set on the deck thanks to the movement of the ship, the Twin Otter leaped into the sky, better than a catapult shot:

Have I mentioned how other-worldly and fantastic the Antarctica scenery is?

Not many divert options, though; unless one wants to try landing on a snowy slope:

I would remember that soon; but at the time a nice pass over Rothera

And final for 36 with the fog settling on the field again (good radio comms on runway clear and conditions today):

Parked the Twin Otter just as KUMIANKKA was on final in a Twin Otter of his own:

Studded snow tires? Chains? Skis? These Twin Otters can get themselves stopped. KUMIANKKA iced it:

The ceiling was dropping big time:

You'd think that would be a good reason to call it a day. But no. I'd noticed GHUN1's plane still floating away on the map and my in-flight TCAS. And AARTIC was going up in a C130 so I followed. Flew out low over the waves and sure enough, there it was:

GHUN1 managed to get it going again. Apparently it handles like a boat. And it got off the water on three engines. In the meantime, I decided that was about enough so I returned to Rothera. Or… Uh. I *tried* to return to Rothera. Several tries. The clouds and fog had merged and with no navaids I was having a very difficult time finding the field. AARTIC had made it back and was waiting but I was getting turned around over water out of sight of land. I'd come up on the field only to see the runway emerge at a too late moment for aligning. And I learned power management in the C130 is different than the Twin Otter or 777. It gets slugish at slow speeds and side-slipping didn't work out so well. I managed to keep it above the water but there were a couple of moments when I may have been kicking up spray! Three or four times I came in off-alignment and otherwise not in a position to do anything other than wave off and go around again, and again:

After three or four of these low-level low-visibility attempts, I could feel the tension building. I was glancing at fuel gauges, remembering my earlier observation about no divert fields, trying to resist going stop-to-stop on the control inputs, acknowledging plan-completion bias, and thinking about ditching and if I could swim ashore before freezing (more rescue helos!) when I got one halfway decent look and managed to hard land it:

REALLY hard. At the time, I felt it bounce a couple of times. On the replay I noticed I landed a little short (which caused a big bounce) and also that the landing gear actually compresses quite a bit on touchdown--visually that's pretty cool for the model! Fortunately these C130s are rugged. I'll radio Maintenance to come look at it tomorrow. For today, I parked it and happily shutdown.

Whew.

=====

[Buckyjunior]

What an interesting location/day for a fly-in. It brought back some memories from about ten years ago when my spouse and I were on a tour to the Antarctic peninsula. I started out near the tip of the peninsula at Teniente Rodolfo Marsh Martin (SCRM) airport and headed south. Along the path was Deception Island, named so because there is only a small opening to the interior of a large caldera. The interior was used to butcher tens of thousands of whales in the early 1900s. I circled the island then circled the interior at about 700'. The only snapshot I'll share was one taken ten years ago.

Arriving after the crowd had left, I waited for other stragglers to arrive. 2nd snap is of Kumi coming in with a DHC6.On an icy runway, low visibility, snow in the air, he made his stop with plenty of runway remaining. (Unlike some others who won't be named.) He claimed studded tires. SURFINTUC decided to try a C-130 and was up and away. Unfortunately, visibility was deteriorating rapidly and without any helpful radio signals (despite the covered radars in the picture), it was difficult to get lined up properly with the runway. There are several snaps of missed landings and go arounds. Local time 14:35, 14:39, 14:47. Finally, at 14:51, he found the groove and put it down, stopping much better than some other who won't be named. Shortly after that, Ghun showed up in an A400 and had a face to face with SurfinTuc.

By-the-way, it turns out that the C-130 makes a reasonable boat. If floats well, steers in the water, and has an anchor if you want to stay in one place for a while. Just sayin'.

[cyl8]

There sure were a bit drama during this event and caught me by surprise. I got in late as some how I must've silenced alarm... Instead of flying from Ushuaia, I loaded up AT01 and already at least 6 planes have landed. Just as I was setting things up, i heard radio chattered about needing rescue team to help out a c130 (i think)  afloat after the end of runway. I needed something that floats so i changed to  the EC145T2 armed with floater and headed over. Unfamiliarity of the craft, CCW vs CW rotor direction, and rather strong wind all made the rescue mission a little tricky. I first tried to land in front, but the second I touched down the wind pushed me toward the floating plane so I pulled collective immediately to avoid collision. I tried a few more times each time I was met with fast drift toward the runway, much more so than the floating c130. I tried the pedal turn on water , but wind over powered my tail rotor and i could not turn more than about 70 degree...

After surf mentioned about the carrier, I found mine after restarting Xplane and paid the frigate a visit. 

After a successful touch down, i got greedy and wanted to land in a small space up front the ship...  that didn't work , the ship hit me from behind. I realized that some one was on final after I hit the reset as it transported me back to the runway of airport, i had to lift up immediately and  parked to the side. Apology for showing up at touchdown zone.

Both surf and kumi were arriving one after another and both were flying the twin otters. Both were able to land and stop near half length of the runway, but the icy runway made it difficult to even get off of it as Kumi struggled.

I wanted to record the wind condition of the flying so I stopped by the windsock, while surf took off again in the c130.

I changed back to AS350 that I am more accustomed to fly with to explore the snowy land a little, and met with some tourists in hot balloons.  Unfortunately had to get breakfast and get ready for a lunch meet up and cut the fly in short for the day.

On a different matter, i think it was rat7 who's seeing weather very differently which gave him the opposite direction for landing compared to the rest. I did't realize they could be this much different? Is noaa better?

thanks

 

[pugwash]

I started the day at the Skyway Rothera station a few miles North/South ??? from Rothera Research Station itself. Code XAT01 (In X-Plane when choosing location type in AT01 and it will give you XAT01 as the other choice).

Flew from there around to AT01 but continued to explore this beautiful land. SkyMax together with RealWeatherConnect gave me fabulous skies and clouds. After landing at AT01 I chose to take a MD 902 Explorer for a run back to Skyway. Once there, the wind had gotten up and I couldn't lift off again so chose to do some work using the Land Rover to get around

Brrr... open top land rover - Not to be recommended.

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