Grosvenor House

[MM]

The management here at Grosvenor House has opened up a free bar for London-Melbourne pilots. This might be a good place to tell your tall tales...er... stories about your adventures on the way. Colorful description and vivid screenshots will be much appreciated.



"Drinks are on the house."

[jt_dub]

Today was the day that the flag dropped on the MacRobertson 80th aniversary event. What a day! Confused about the start time I pulled myself together an hour earlier than I needed to for the kickoff, but there was a good crowd already gathered on the SOH teamspeak. Nick was to fly our King Air on the first leg out of Melbourne to Charleville. Ron Attwood was flying the Lancair IVP. I decided to join them on Ron's multiplayer server flying escort in the Cessna Citation Mustang.

Everything seemed to be going well as Modern Era pilots setup in Melbourne, and the Golden Age pilots setup in Mildenhall. Ron and Nick setup on opposite headings on the same runway and Ron started his takeoff roll first heading towards the highly detailed office towers and extremely dense autogen buildings depicted in the Orbx Australia region. Nick started his takeoff roll once Ron was airborne. Less than 20 seconds later a very LOUD explitive got the attention of everyone on teamspeak, followed by more choice expressions of frustration and a not a little bit of anger. Those present were informed that Ron had gotten an OOM and his FSX had shutdown. The veterans on the channel tried to console Ron and explained that this kind of thing has happened to everyone, but Ron was having none of it. After a few minutes and encouragement Ron agreed to restart the leg with settings pulled back to normal to prevent another OOM. Once underway Ron was thrown into the deep end of engine management and had lots of fun with engine leaning, icing, carb heat, turbine overheating. Once Ron was underway I tried to catch up with Nick but could not overtake him before he got to Charleville. Once I arrived I got out of the Cessna Mustang and took command of N406KA. I waited and watched Ron bring home his first event leg. Well done Ron.

My own leg began without a hitch as I took off and climbed quickly to my cruise altitude of 17,500. Once at cruise I joined the general banter on teamspeak and settled in for the four plus hours to Darwin. I had been underway for about and hour and 30 minutes and decided it was time to grab a screenshot.




Shortly after this I was switching between the forums/teamspeak/Duenna and FSX when I experienced the dreaded "cream screen" and hourglass in FSX with "(not responding)" showing in the window header bar. I waited 15 seconds hoping it would go live but it stayed in a paused state. I notified folks on teamspeak and consulted the rules to see what it would cost me in penalty if the leg failed. I was informed that I would have to go back and refly the leg. This I did not want to do. As this discussion proceeded on teamspeak I started shuting down every non-FSX essential applications that was running. After about 5 minutes FSX responded with a splash screen saying that I had been disconnected from Ron's multiplayer server and did I want to continue flying offline. You bet I did. I answered YES and FSX resumed, then I hit the re-connect button on the Duenna and it started running again. Whew!!! About 3 hours later and easy approach and landing at Darwin. Ahh, it is great to be back at it.

[Willy]

Yep! It's a Gee Bee!!

[Dangerousdave26]

That's not going to Buff out!

[AussieMan]

Yep! It's a Gee Bee!!

A true Panther. Flames and all .

[spokes2112]

.-. . ---... / -- .- -.-. .-. --- -... . .-. - ... --- -. / .-. .- -.-. . / .-. . .--. --- .-. - .-.-.- -....- ... - --- .--.
- --- / .---- .---- ----. / .--. .. -.-. -.-. .- -.. .. .-.. .-.. -.-- .-.-.- -....- ... - --- .--.
-- .. -.- . / .-.. . .- ...- .. -. --. / .- - .... . -. ... .-.-.- -....- ... - --- .--.
..-. .. .-.. -- / ... - --- -.-. -.- / - --- / .- .-. .-. .. ...- . / -... -.-- / -.-. --- ..- .-. .. . .-. .-.-.- -....- ... - --- .--.
.--. ..- -... .-.. .. ... .... / .. -- -- . -.. .. .- - . .-.. -.-- .-.-.- -....- ... - --- .--.

Re: MacRobertson race Report.-Stop
To 119 Piccadilly.-Stop
Mike leaving Athens.-Stop
Film stock to arrive by courier.-Stop
Publish immediately.-Stop

[spokes2112]

Arrived at Jask, Iran after a somewhat uneventful flight. Needed to climb up to 11,900 and go off course to avoid (blindly) the Zagros mountain range. When in view took 2 or 3 different valleys to get through it. Most of the time it was an overcast haze.

At the Jask refueling depot & Royal Aero club's flight office.. Is that Ms. Nellie's sister in the background? Hubba Hubba.

[PRB]

It was an interesting first leg from Mildenhall to Marseille. The weather was beautiful across the English Channel, and navigation was easy on account
of so many ADF stations across France. However, as we approached the “Central Massif” of mountains that lie along southern France, the weather turned
a bit stinko, with heavy rain and pretty much no visibility. Just as I was approaching the mountains? What, surprised? Me? No. We busted out of the
rain storm in due course, but as we approached the coast, there were big thunderstorms to drive through. The approach went fine, although this plane
seems to have “issues” with directional control authority at low speed. That's how I'm going to explain the fact that I landed in the grass next to
the giant Space Shuttle sized runway at Marseille... Sounds better than “I missed the runway”…

Here's a video of the "landing". Maybe there was a gust of wind at the last moment.

[PRB]

Oh, and I have photographic evidence of space aliens. Check out this UFO over Central France I spotted. What could it be?

[robert41]

Long flight to Baghdad.
Only a couple of screw ups. First, setting the wrong heading from Mildenhall. A bit south of course, but still picked up the first ndb on the Dutch coast. The second was setting a second ndb, in Eastern Europe, picking this up right away, and not realizing at first that it should be some 3-400nm later on my course. Fortunate that this other ndb was near my course, so no loss.
The weather was pretty good until I got out over the Black Sea. Then came some thunderstorms. Not too bad at first. Winds picked up to 25kts, stayed in one direction, no turbulence, no rain, no visibility. Then into Turkey, the winds started shifting around. Having to throttle back many times to keep from overspeeding.
Finally clearing getting into Syria. And the long haul down to Baghdad. Very few ndb's, but easy to follow the rivers and lakes.


Sunrise over Eastern Europe.


Iraq desert.

[robert41]

Made it to Allahabad. Pretty good flight till getting into the storms in India. Some 4 or 5 hours of them. Winds were pretty good for the most part. One big wind shift near the end almost took the wings off. I throttled back for the last 200 miles or so.

[Willy]

And another outstanding Gee Bee landing....