Interested in a Flight?

[SeanTK]

Just wondering if a few here would be interested in a group flight on the VATSIM system at the following time:

1:00pm Sunday, August 21 2011: NZ/Auckland time.
Equaling-----
9:00pm Saturday, August 20 2011: USA Eastern time (for me and any US people looking...)

Hamilton (NZHN)
TO
Rotorua (NZRO)

If anyone is interested, let me know!

EDIT: Quick question about altitude rules. In the US, it's East = Odd thousands of feet, West = Even thousands (+500 if VFR for either direction).
In NZ, I believe the division was North/South due to the geographic situation? Not sure if I am recalling this correctly, but was it South = Even alts, North = Odd alts, or do I have it backwards?

Thanks!

[deeknow]

QUOTE (SeanTK @ Aug 18 2011,10:50 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Just wondering if a few here would be interested in a group flight on the VATSIM system

Hey Sean, yeah I'd be a starter for that. Have you posted somethign at VATNZ.NET to see if they can provide ATC for you? Someone is sure to oblidge if you give them some notice.

QUOTE (SeanTK)

In NZ, I believe the division was North/South due to the geographic situation? Not sure if I am recalling this correctly, but was it South = Even alts, North = Odd alts, or do I have it backwards?[/quote]
Affirm. South even, North odd

[SeanTK]

QUOTE (deeknow @ Aug 17 2011,9:32 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Hey Sean, yeah I'd be a starter for that. Have you posted somethign at VATNZ.NET to see if they can provide ATC for you? Someone is sure to oblidge if you give them some notice.

Was considering doing that. Haven't even registered with them yet since I haven't used the system enough lately, but I'll certainly consider giving them a heads up in the next day or two once I get a clearer idea of my weekend to be sure that this will actually happen.

[Dontcopy]

Yip, I should be up to that!
Depends if my FSX is up and running by then, we'll see.

[LMerraine]

With heights in NZ, I remember to always follow my nose (North Odd, South Even)

[deeknow]

QUOTE (SeanTK @ Aug 18 2011,3:42 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Was considering doing that. Haven't even registered with them yet since I haven't used the system enough lately, but I'll certainly consider giving them a heads up in the next day or two once I get a clearer idea of my weekend to be sure that this will actually happen.

Not sure if you know Sean but Sunday each week is the busiest night for flying on vatsim in NZ when you can guarentee some ATC coverage.

Of course you may not want to fly when its busy, but the vatnz guys are very accomodating, I'm sure if you prefer, and if we could get a group together, that they could roster someone on for a quiet time where noone would have to worry too much about looking silly if they are only new to local procedures, radio comms, and vatsim itself.

[ZKIWI]

QUOTE (LMerraine @ Aug 19 2011,5:51 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

With heights in NZ, I remember to always follow my nose (North Odd, South Even)

I just remember that odd bastards come from the South. (No points for guessing which island i am from!)

[SeanTK]

I'll definitely be online! Thanks to the massive time difference, it'll be Saturday evening for me, and midday Sunday for the NZ locals. No problem with it being busy online. It'll be a neat experience.

Thinking about using the Carenado Cessna C208 (Grand) Caravan.
Livery: Air2There (yes, I know this would be too far north, but it's either that or Air Safaris, so.....)

Any other recommendations for an aircraft to use on this trip?

EDIT: Applied with VATNZ and now just need to wait for account approval for the forum portion of their website. If anyone wants to give them a link to this thread/event ahead of time, go ahead, since I may not get approval until the middle of the night for me (thanks timezones!).

[deeknow]

QUOTE (SeanTK)

If anyone wants to give them a link to this thread/event ahead of time, go ahead

Done, see:
http://www.vatnz.net/forum/viewtopic.php?f=12&t=2762

ps - If anyone else fancies joining Sean, do the VATNZ guys a favour and book yorur flight with estimated dep time and route using vroute, its free to install and use, you can find it here:
http://www.vroute.net/

[SeanTK]

I'll try to book it as soon as I get some VATSIM account issues sorted.

I have squawkbox set to automatically enter the password, but I cannot remember what the actual password is! So...I can fly as long as the program continues to automatically enter a password.
Additionally, the email on the account is no longer valid for me.
Sent a support ticket to change my email and for password change/recovery, so we'll see what they say.

In any case, I can fly, but I can't book a flight ahead of time (yet!).

[SeanTK]

Booked it. Looks like Dean booked his for for noon, so this flight has now shifted to start at noon, NZ time.

Depending on the time, maybe a jaunt over to Whakatane after RO....

[Ian Warren]

Hi Sean , good effort getting up and running , I join you guys but you would not understand me half time with this annoying couch , VATSIM is something i have not tried at all , so stick to scenery time being .

[SeanTK]

Spoke with Ian and Dean on TS for a while, then did a great flight from KLAX to KLAS (LA to Vegas) on VATSIM. Unfortunately, my system decided to CTD on short final, but other than that, it was a good flight.

Simultaneous departures at LAX between Dean and I (literally side by side!) and then Dean followed me to Vegas.

EDIT: It was a squawkbox crash that killed the whole program. Was sending a message to Dean to tell him to quit riding my plane's butt!

[deeknow]

QUOTE (SeanTK @ Aug 21 2011,2:37 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Simultaneous departures at LAX between Dean and I (literally side by side!) and then Dean followed me to Vegas.

Yeah that was great timing all right, and the guy controlling the LA area was fantastic (Aaron?), really impressed the way those guys can juggle so many balls at once, it was relatively quiet but aircraft all over the region and coming and going from a few different airports.

Bad luck re the crash Sean, dump SB if your using FSX it caused me no end of trouble, I'm on FSinn now with not probs so far for months. For a moment there I thought I had overrun you on the approach coz I turned in for finals not long after you, but turned out it was an AI trying to merge w the rear end of my B763

update: Was a real nice night local time for a flight, here's a screenie of me in the ABEX Cargo 763 and Sean up ahead in the 737, both heading downwind to setup for a visual app RWY25L...

[SeanTK]

Well, I'm addicted to VATSIM again now that I jumped into a heavy route head first!

The only bad thing is that NZ probably only has coverage when it's like 4 or 5 in the morning for me, and Europe is pretty quiet in the evenings....so the US it is then.
[i](If there were some controllers that could do 1 or 2pm mid-afternoon on a weekend (NZ time), that would be perfect and I bet that the country would receive a good bit of traffic if the whole country was covered by a couple guys for a few hours. 1 or 2pm your time seems to be a VERY busy time for US VATSIM activity, and I'm sure there would be a draw from there if they saw that there was a decent ATC presence for a while.)

Just did a short one in the 185 from Auckland to Hamilton, with the only coverage being Auckland ground for all of 5 minutes, and I was the only plane in the country!

[deeknow]

QUOTE (SeanTK @ Aug 21 2011,4:04 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

[i](If there were some controllers that could do 1 or 2pm mid-afternoon on a weekend (NZ time), that would be perfect and I bet that the country would receive a good bit of traffic if the whole country was covered by a couple guys for a few hours. 1 or 2pm your time seems to be a VERY busy time for US VATSIM activity

Great idea, you should post that over at vatnz.net. I'm free midday Sunday generally for a couple of hours, let me know if you wanna do another US flight some time

[Ian Warren]

Hmm maybe a quik jaunt around New Zealand in a couple of A2A B17s ... Hell the USA OSHKOSH ... photo real airshow already hanging in there