FSX-SE To Antarctica - the final frontier (Part I)

[P_7878 6,761]

You may have seen the recent post of the (CS) C-130/L-100 by Thibodba57, who recollects, in that post, his first (professional) flight-crew assignment as a member of the Alaska Air National Guard in the Hercules C-130. And, in RW, the (sister) division of the New York Air National Guard (routinely) flies LC-130H aircraft (equipped with ski-like landing gear - please see, below, for a (SIM) image of it from the CS package) on Polar missions, and this operation has been on-going for 60 years! So, in this post, here, I got triggered to bring back the (CS) C-130 into a bit more (SIM) action with a flight from Christchurch (New Zealand) to the McMurdo Research Station in Antarctica (Please regard this post as Part I). I'm barely getting to re-familiarize myself with this SIM (nearly 6 years, since last I flew it) - trying to catch up! I wish to use the C-130 in my first Civilian livery (Lynden Air Cargo thanks to Thibodba57's lovely repaint of this (Anchorage (Alaska) based) Cargo Airline - repaint just made available in the Library here).

And, just FYI, Lynden Air Cargo (C-130) has, indeed, recently conquered Antarctica! Lynden Air Cargo has now joined a short list of operators that serve all seven continents by starting a new project in support of an Italian Antarctic Expedition team. "Antarctica was the final continent on our checklist," says the Lynden Air Cargo spokesperson. "Now we can cross it off." The month-long mission lasted from Oct. 30 through Nov. 30 (2018) and involved carrying supplies from Christchurch, New Zealand to the Italian base Mario Zucchelli Station and the (newest) Phoenix Field at McMurdo Station. You may wish to see a short, but interesting, (30 sec) video by first searching on-line for "lynden air cargo and antarctica", and then (likely) the (first) topic "New Antarctica service puts Lynden on all continents". Besides the C-130, many other aircraft conduct flights into Antarctica to the respective stations maintained by individual nations from around the world. Such aircraft include DHC Twin Otters, Douglas DC-3/BT-67, C-17A Globemaster, C-141 Starlifter, (RNZAF) Boeing 757 etc. (including tourist fly-overs by B747/A380). In the SIM, if interested, you may use any of these (or any other appropriate aircraft) instead of C-130 for flights into Antarctica. But, you would like to own the (P3DV4 compatible) Aerosoft scenery package, which, I'm using for this post. The Aerosoft's Antarctica is a very nice add-on. The manual, that's supplied with the package, is well-written and a highly informative document, that contains many fascinating details about all aspects of Polar flight operations.

Antarctica is truly the final frontier of flight on our planet! From a (RW) pilot‘s perspective, Antarctica is a challenging and immensely rewarding environment, and relatively few people ever get the opportunity to fly there. It is unique in that it is an extremely remote and a starkly desolate part of the earth except for the few research stations, manned by scientists from countries around the world. The climate is harsh and there are no roads, no trees, and no buildings (and limited ATC!) to get any sense of direction and place. When you land in the South Pole on an average day, it's minus 30 (to minus 50) degrees and you're standing and landing on ice that is two and a half miles thick! You're 9,300 feet above sea level, and there's a whole host of extra challenges that come with such (flight) operations. While most of Antarctica is covered by thick ice shield, there are quite a few mountainous areas on the continent like the highest peak Mount Vinson (16,050 ft) or the well known Mount Erebus (12,448 ft) - site of the tragic Mount Erebus disaster. Mount Erebus is within sight of (and only 25 miles away from) McMurdo station (see Aerosoft Chart below). Here and there, you can also find peaks though the ice shield, which are actually the summits of mountain ranges covered under the ice. The Antarctic (visiting) season only lasts for a maximum of 5-6 months (October-through-February), and then it quickly changes to winter when it becomes too cold, windy, and eventually it goes into total darkness for several months of the year.

McMurdo is what usually comes in mind first when people think about a base in Antarctica. From/to McMurdo, the backbone for long distance continental transportation, as stated earlier, is the LC-130H Hercules operated by the New York Air Guard, sometimes equipped with JATOS (rockets that enable the aircraft to take off from runways that would otherwise be too short). Many other nation's Air Forces also utilize the C-130 aircraft for flights into their respective stations. The Aerosoft package has attempted to faithfully recreate the actual elevation data for the continent. It has also accurately simulated many important landmarks (which I/we hope visit in Part II of my post). So, here in Part I, please find a few test (and trial) images of the Lynden Air Cargo C-130 lifting off from Christchurch....my next plan, if I can, is to repeat the full (2350 miles) flight by equipping this CS C-130 with, at least, a basic version of (freeware) Delco CIVA INS for the flight. I've shown, below, a proposed SIMBRIEF route, that shows 8-9 INS (LAT/LONG) waypoints derived from an actual Flightplan provided by the Aerosoft in their package. The Polar LC-130 Ski plane (last image shown below) is at NZIR/McMurdo/Ice Rwy (with date set to today (8th Feb), literally the end of the Antarctic visit window).

[Note: BTW, There are several (practical/professional) suggestions in the Readme of Thibodba57's repaint file, to significantly improve the realism with this (SIM) aircraft.]

Anyway, I hope you enjoy these pictures here. Thanks for your interest (or/and any comments)!

[CS(C-130) / AS(Antarctica) / REX / Lynden (L-100-30J) livery by Thibodba57]

[thibodba57 462]

Nice shots! Thanks for taking the girl out to fly!

[P_7878 6,761]

Appreciated the kind words, Brian! 
And, good rest of the weekend!

[Clutch Cargo 388]

Just an FYI, Aerosoft made a wonderful addon called AntarcticaX which sounds like it would be perfect for your venture.  Perhaps you already know about it?

Clutch

[P_7878 6,761]

Clutch, thanks for the note!

Yes, it's Aerosoft's "Antarctica X" that I've used and referred to above in my post....and, agree, it's, indeed, a great product...(have been reading their manual cover-to-cover)..

Without that, all one will get in (FSX), on landing at the Pole, is just simmering snow and nothing else...🙂..have done it a couple of times...

(Looking forward to the visit of the various stations/airfields there with this scenery).....

[Phantom88 3,289]

Beautiful....What A Workhorse. 

[HaraldG 559]

Great story, great plane, great scenery, great pictures - I'm out of superlatives...

[NWATech 96]

^^^ Harald took the words right out my mouth! Good stuff!

[P_7878 6,761]

Patrick, Harald, NWATech: Many thanks for the comments!!

Patrick: A workhorse it is indeed...(the versatile jack of all trades)...Lockheed's design from the 50s that has stood the test of time!

Harald: For scenery, btw, I forgot to give due credit to Orbx's (NZ)...they have indeed done a remarkable job with those two (beautiful) islands..!

NWATech: Glad you liked it!

[Now a bit about Lynden Air Cargo's mission to Antarctica...This was accomplished with an augmented crew which included 9 members (2 Captains + 1 First Officer + 3 Flight Engineers + 2 Aircraft Mechanics + 1 Loadmaster) plus 9 people on the ground in Christchurch. The plane made wheeled landing in the newest Phoenix Airfield (NZFX) which has now replaced the earlier Pegasus Field (NZPG)...at the McMurdo station.]

[Ted Striker 338]

Great screenshots and very interesting dialogue. You must be a history teacher. If not, you are now.   Looking forward to part II

Ted

[P_7878 6,761]

Ted: Two thoughts come to my mind here...

1. In these days of (FW) internet resources, it's not too hard to be an on-line Teacher of anything...🙂...but the problem is to become a real expert by such means alone...
2. And, unfortunately, for practical reasons, we cannot always do for a living what we want (or have wanted) to do...that's probably one of the reasons many of us have gathered here as a recourse...🙂...

[Meanwhile, yours truly "sole" pilot is a bit under the weather and may have to delay the Antarctic expedition by a few extra days...preparations are on-going, though...thanks...!]