***Official SOH race story thread ONLY! ***

[crashaz]

Please keep this thread clean!

This thread will be used to post stories by pilots of the Sim-Outhouse team in regards to their race legs.

All posts by race pilots concerning the SOH race legs are encouraged.

Any team member flying baton,wingman, WX or airport reporting flights for a particular leg are asked to write a brief (50 words or more)account of their leg.

Also include pics!

Thanks to team members for participating. Our SOH members appreciate a look into the general feel of the race!

Good luck team!

[Moses03]

While not part of the race proper, here are a few shots from this morning's Tasmanian wildlife rescue capturing the mood at Launceston. There was plenty of radio chatter as everyone was anxious to get things going.

Maybe we can get WWF to sponsor the race next year.

[dcc]

shot of my plane as MaddogK departed with the King Air full of critters

- dcc

[crashaz]

Well we finally got started on the official start of the race. While hauling roos was interesting.. it was nice to be back flying alone. Serene up there while flying a team flight to YSCB.

That was until the weather started getting interesting on the approach down. Ran into some weather but landed safely!

Tail end Charlie as usual!

[Dangerousdave26]

Problems started right off the bat when I first fired up the Engines.

Its been a long time since the Extra has been pulled out of the hanger and the Engine started smoking extensively.

The crack Mechanic Team got to work and cleared the problem and Off we go.

After closing in on Paul she started smoking again then I found the problem....

I had the smoke on.

[MaddogK]

Not much to tell- Started the day off listening to the chatter of the other pilots shuttling in the critters from all over Tasmania while waiting on the ramp with the King Air warming up. Soon as the crates were loaded I asked for confirmation that all were aboard- about 5 times. I could tell the others were getting pissed as all I heard over the radio was broken jibberish like what my tape deck sounds like when it's eating one of my favorite tapes, but through it all I could barely make out "go go", so away I went. To make a long story short I got a pretty good tailwind as I could see my wingman falling behind. Made a perfect landing in Melbourne and posted the delivery notice, but realized I only had about 3 minutes to switch planes as I cut the delivery too close to the time limit, and was scheduled for the first 'official' hop of the race.

The Mooney was fueled and waiting as I poured out of the king-air but was looking forward to my beating. It took a couple minutes too long to locate the proper posting phrase, and to switch the duenna settings for the official wing hop, so as I was second on the runway most of my teammates went around me and took off. As soon as I could post departure, I hit the the button to start duenna, and gave the Mooney full throttle, then dropped the first notch of flaps. I still had not setup the plane for the flight but was glad to get her off the ground and retract the gear, followed by the flaps. It took me about 5 minutes to get the otto set for altitude and a couple more to get the destination set into the GPS while I watched my teammates drift into the horizon. I finally got a break some 15 minutes into the flight to snap a shot, and pull my shaking hands from the stick to light up a smoke.

Some 2 hours later having made up most of the ground lost on my departure I line up on final at YSCB about a mile behind the baton only to hear "Don't ask". Next thing I know I'm rolling to a stop on the runway and posting the successful arrival of the wing only later finding out I had become the baton carrier.

Helluva way to start the day, needing a break I order some Egg-Foo-Young from the local Chinese restaurant ( for delivery) and head for the shower to wash the stink from the Kangaroos off me. Only a few more days to go.

:ernae:

[jkcook28]

Relaxing on the ramp at YMLT after a 1hr run to YSMI on the Wombat run.

[srgalahad]

Beautiful downtown Mackay Qnsld... it IS beautiful, but there is a curse against Donald Douglas at the airport. 3 DC-3's eaten - two by an invisible hole on Rwy 32 and one by wet grass/tailwinds/brake failure/trees? and the curse.
A nice, but bumpy flight in the old Gooney with less than happy landings. At least, and at last we made it... grrrrr

[jkcook28]

Vimy to Hamilton Is. Are we there yet? :d

[Haitun]

Yesterday (on my onboard clock) I took the echidnas into the baron - they were quiet and nice. I tried to land the plane gently, not to scare poor animals and suceeded. Wanted to make second run to St.Helen's but there were already 4 planes in the air, so I decided to help Maddogk to put the animals into king air. After dealing with siberian tigers in Harbin I'm not wery afraid of the Australian fauna.

The bravo flight was almost uneventful, although the landing was far from perfect - need to contact my lawyer and ask if the insurance covers broken nosewheel. There was no crash, but to my disappointment i forgot to turn my Duenna on.:faint:

As for the piper flight today - the weather was find, and i opened the door to have some fresh air. The landing was almost perfect.

Sorry folks - no pics today - Easy Ed's forester kangaroo got it's paws on my camera. Perhaps next time it will be prepared and repaired.
:amen:

[Moses03]

Some assorted screenies from today's action.

-Goons and super Goons in action during second ill-fated team flight.

-JC greasing the stylish Vimy.

-Standing by in the Do 335, sweating like a pig in the cockpit under the tropic sun. (Note amount of fuel left in last screenie)

I'm too tired at the moment to write up a nice long pirep...

[Haitun]

View of Corsair above New Guinea - that kangaroo almost destroyed the camera

[Flyin Bull]

Do you fancy a nice morning flight in Tasmania they said, Would you mind picking up a nice furry critter for us? they asked. I said "no problem" which was fine until I reached Hobart and found the "furry critter" was a Tasmanian Devil! Now I need a new Beech.

Was glad to get down to some serious racing after the flight with the devil. Took the Hornet for a nice spin to Truk.

Steve

[Kowalski65]

No pics as IrfanView didnt work,so have got a new prog But anyway, as a newbie, I was absolutely terrifed of setting off & making a prat of myself, so chose the shortest possible anial run,just in case I messed up then I had time to refly. Didnt need it though, managed to get down safely, to be handed a box of small snuffling things -I thought they said kittens, not echidnas! Got them back OK too, but forgot to post on takeoff:faint:Even had time to duplicate the kanagroo flight just in case but thankfully wasnt needed.
Then onto the main race itself, and after a real fight geting the mooney onto course, landed safely at Canberra in the team flight-4 good landings in a row-must be a record for me!

[Flyin Bull]

Waiting at Saipan for my flight to Iwojima, with dave landing with the baton in an electrical storm.

Steve

[Dangerousdave26]

Team Flight from YBRK to YBHM in the Gruman Goose

Flying with the gooney birds was short lived. I had to play catch up as I forgot to start Duenna before I launched.

//---------------------------------------------------

Waiting on Flying Bull to arrive in the dead of night. The Hornet is easy to fly until you run into a thunder storm that almost flips you upside down.

As luck would have it the weather cleared up on final but I was sweating it.

//---------------------------------------------------

Tokyo Run

They asked me not to come back under any uncertain terms.

I can't figure out why. ????

[Moses03]

RJCN-UHPP

You never know how the winds aloft are going to be in this area but when the weather scouts reported excess tailwinds it eased the fear of a fuel challenged warbird.

-Gnoopey on final in the cabin cruiser while srgalahad and I look on.

-Screenie of gauges and stuff showing that wonderful tailwind (and the abuse we give these planes running at full map & rpm!).

-Decision height at UHPP.

[Gnoopey]

... RJTC => RJCN ... "cabin cruising" in an OnMark Marksman B - pretty stylish ... until this 'stupid pilot' missed the runway ( @ RJCN) by a few feet in his 'race fever' ... fortunately all went well ...

Side note - doing the own 'first' leg in consecutive instances of the RTWR for this 'pilot', beginning in such a classy Douglas design (fictive livery done on purpose for last years RTW instance - not published )!

[Gnoopey]

... UHPP => UHMA - cold war icons meet during this years RTWR - a bunch of SAC's finest Superfortresses were using old soviet air force bases in the Kamtchatka peninsula area ... (or yet even bigger aluminum "clouds" on another "Avanti hunting mission" :d) ....

JohnC did the best possible wingman job - once again I have to admit! Overtaking the lead A/C and motivating all the way to the finish line to another success! ThankXXX shipmate!

[Moses03]

PAOM-PAMC

Switched to the "winterized" 335 for the 277nm mad dash from Nome, Alaska. My first panic moment as right after takeoff I noticed that the Dornier was not climbing as it should. The rear engine was not getting up to power for some reason so I had to abort and restart real fast. Meanwhile JC was sprinting out ahead in the Seafury as wingman. After a couple of minutes of frenzied mouse clicking I got started again and eventully overtook the Seafury. :woot:

[Tako_Kichi]

PAMC-PANC my first leg as baton holder! :woot:

It was a late afternoon flight over the mountains in the Grumman Goose that started out with scattered low clouds and low winds...all that was to change during the course of the leg however. As we climbed so the wind increased and was virtually dead on the nose.

I am really glad that Dave and I scouted out the leg beforehand and decided on a safe altitude to fly at as we hit clouds over the mountains and a couple of times I popped out of the clouds to see mountain tops just 500ft below me.

The wind had also swung around to a tail wind of around 20 knots which was pushing us along at a fair lick and I was riding the edge of the yellow band on the ASI.

Once over the mountains we decided to head down but unfortunately Dave found some turbulence and the next thing we knew he had overstressed the Goose and it was game over for him. Within seconds of him announcing the problem I also bounced in the turbulent air and the ASI needle got very close to the red line. Only a fast hand on the throttle stopped me going into overspeed!

With Dave out it was now down to me with 40 miles to go and one more ridge to clear. I must admit to having a case of the old 'sweaty palms' for a few minutes but once the last ridge was cleared I could see it was fair weather and flat land all the way to the finish line. The airport appeared basking in glorious sunshine when I was about 15 miles out and then it was just a case of getting lined up and controlling the descent.

The landing was a 'greaser' if I say so myself and I let her roll to a stop under her own steam as the Goose is notorious for tipping on her nose as soon as you touch the brakes.

It was certainly an interesting flight for the first time as baton holder and a shame that Dave met problems with turbulence...better luck next flight Dave! :ernae:

[whitehawk_2009]

Just got done with a nice night flight from CYQH to CYEG. We had a great baton pass that was assisted with multi-player and Teamspeak. A pretty uneventful flight, few clouds until I got closer to CYEG. Descending through 2000' AGL I encountered a very thick fog that limited visibility to about four miles. Good thing this was a lighted airport, otherwise I might not have made it.

WH

[Haitun]

KOFK-KELD. The flight was pretty uneventful, till 100 nm from El Dorado - the power started to drop suddenly.

KELD-KMLU. Ince again in a Cub! It started with a rain - i like that "thud-thud" sound on the roof, when you are in a default FSX J-3. This flight was also uneventful and pretty nice.

[Flyin Bull]

Must be a bit of a masochist, Had a baton run at night in the Vimmy with Gnoopey as wing the if that didn't seem like to much I volunteered to fly wing in the Jenny.

[Haitun]

Speaking of masochism - has been cruising back and forth over the canal 6 or 8 times in a trike, while waiting for the baton.
The landing at 13 knots wind was hard - had to turn engine off to land - it won't decent otherise=). Could done it in R22, but I suppose the teammates would kill me for that.