Island landing 1 (V2.1)
Flight created on 28.12.2018 (Last modified 17.06.2019
30.05.2023 V2.1.English)
Estimated flight duration 45min.
Difficulty: Easy - Hard (Adjustable at the beginning)
Mission: Deliver goods to an island, flying no higher than 200 feet.
This flight only works with P3dV4, in P3DV5 the landscape has changed.
Introduction
As a young aspiring pilot looking for work, you have hired a dubious-looking transport company.
Shady, but the pay is great!
Now you will make your first flight.
This is a solo flight, no co-pilot, no messages via radio (the new boss wants absolute radio silence). So you will have to follow the instructions in the kneeboard.
You are on the Florida Keys Marathon (KMTH) runway. Take off, follow the described course and land on the grassy area of a small island called Spy Key. Take off again and land at the Summerland Key Cove (FD51) airfield.
Start
So you're the new guy who's standing in for our colleague who's gone on ...uh... went on 'Swedish vacation' for 3 years? Well, I hope you know your way around a 10A?
What do you mean: 'not really'? But you can fly? Fine, you know your way around the modern Baron58. The 10A is exactly the same, 2 wings, 2 engines, you'll be fine. What, autopilot?
Yes, the 10A also has a simple autopilot:
1 turns on the autopilot
2 sets the heading(HDG)
3 you use to align the heading gyro with the magnetic compass (but you won't need that on this short flight).
You will have to maintain altitude without autopilot, because you are supposed to fly 100-150 feet. Do not exceed 200 feet or you will go to your colleague in 'Sweden'.
The portable GPS is broken, so you have to navigate by sight. However, I have prepared detailed directions for you here, so that you can find your way to your destination without any problems. Luckily I took some pictures during my last flight, so I'm happy to share them with you.
Since you are not familiar with this airplane, I will write down the most important settings which you should observe during the flight. Start the engines (you can read how to do this in the kneeboard, or press 'ctrl+E').
Fine, the motors are running, then you can start.
But before you start: I just got cold feet, I really need a hot foot bath. So you will have to fly alone, good luck!
I'm getting off now. Before takeoff, don't forget to set the flaps to 2, trim to about 6 (you'll find the trim crank overhead, by the way), and if you want to autopilot the course, set 071 right away.
Now take off and climb to 100-150 feet. Retract the landing gear and flaps. Set the propeller to 2000RPM and power to about 22inch Hg, so you should reach about 135-140 knots (adjust power as needed).
Fly course 071 (or follow the road) until you see a lighthouse after about 6min. Fly towards the lighthouse.
At the lighthouse (not too early, only close to the lighthouse) turn to heading 333, ignore the immediately visible island, another island appears shortly behind it. Slow down your flight to 100 knots on approach (extend flaps and landing gear, propeller to full power). Fly just past the island on the left, just behind it is the target island.
The grass area is short, so approach as slowly as possible (about 80 knots), touch down as early as possible and full braking!
The landing was definitely not easy, roll to the end of the grassy area, turn around and roll to the boat.
Open the door to unload the plane.
Everything is unloaded. Set flaps to 2 and set trim for takeoff (I recommend trim 6.5 when landing you probably had trim 10 or more).
The runway is short, so apply full brakes and full thrust. Once the engines are at full power, release the brakes, duck your head for less wind resistance (little joke) and off you go! At 60 knots nose up (no not your nose, the plane's nose) and take off.
Very close takeoff, once you gain some altitude, retract the landing gear and flaps. Fly back up 100-150 feet and about heading 248. The goods are offloaded, but we don't want anyone to discover where that was.
Did you reduce propeller speed and power again? Good job! The 10A is a very robust and fault-tolerant airplane, but it is also quite old and therefore a gentle flying style is certainly appropriate.
You will see only water for the next 40 Nm (approx. 10 min. flight at 135 knots), look out of the left window, then you will see the island chain in the distance, at least a few high trees and masts, which you flew over on the outward flight.
After a while islands appear in front of you, from there you can climb as high as you like, I recommend 1500 feet for a better overview and to find the runway. There will be no way to track where you are coming from, so low flying is no longer necessary.
You will soon see a group of islands. From the largest island, a conspicuous bridge leads to the islands behind it. At the 4th island is the runway. By the way, this is a good time to turn to the west (270°), keep an eye on the bridge, because the runway is not yet visible.
By the way, you are now in the tailwind section of a normal aerodrome circuit. Adjust power, flaps, landing gear as needed, turn left and land the aircraft. The runway is sufficiently long, but very narrow, barely wider than the wheelbase of this aircraft. Fortunately, the aircraft is off-road capable, so don't worry if you get a little off the runway.
I hope you enjoyed this flight, if so please give feedback to p3d@andi20.ch . Also send error messages (spelling mistakes, wrong information, etc.) to p3d@andi20.ch, I appreciate any feedback.