EHM-3061 Bilbao to Heathrow - Dash 8Q400

I had to abandon my IVAO world tour at leg #11, I just don't have that much time to do 64 legs of nearly 2 hours each. Don't people have girlfriends or real lives? don't they work?

Anyway, lately as the sun begins to make its final approach to Spring season I feel more energized and it is less dark so I can venture on the computer. I have been more active on the EuroHarmony virtual airline I "fly" for, specially because I love "flying" the airliners (B737/B767/A320) but to do that with them I had to begin from the bottom as single propeller "pilot" :(. Nowadays I am on Class 3 (Senior Turbo Prop) and after this one more flight of at least 1:30 hours and I get another promotion.

This is a short description of flight EHM-3061 from Bilbao,Spain (ICAO:LEBB) to London Heathrow,England (ICAO:EGLL). I have been doing my Class 3 entirely on a Dash 8-Q400 I had refurbished with Ground Proximity Warning and some extra avionics plus some extra cockpit views.

The flight will take over two hours not taking into account the 1 hour I had to spent days before preparing the flight plan, getting departure and approach charts, etc.

At Bilbao I had ATC coverage (Bilbao Tower), the weather was bad with low visibility and variable winds from 19-27 knots, QNH 1011. My original plan from a few days ago called for Runway 30 SSN.1A departure. When at the apron on my virtual cockpit going through my checklists and reviewing the charts the ATC told me I now had to use SSN.1C departure so I had a bit of delay getting this information from Flight Sim Commander X (which is not too great but better than nothing). Luckily I had also printed departure charts. A Continental flight was inbound and had troubles getting locked on ILS with the low visibility. The guy landed his virtual aircraft (apparently some Embraer jet) but landed too hard and lost his front landing gear :( My departure was also delayed because he was requesting a lot of ATC time.

Finally I had pushback and startup after my IFR flight plan was approved. Taxied to rwy 30 ash shown in the picture (rainy, huh?). I took off climbing runway heading for my initial climb to 12000ft. 9 nm outbound turn 180 degrees and proceeded to San Sebastian VOR.

Later I was transferred to Bordeaux Center (LFBB_CTR) until I reached cruise altitude (21000'). The ATC instructed me to climb to FL220 (some French regulations) and had a nice flight. Took a pic when overflying Arcachon bay near Bordeaux, nice memories from a trip with a former girlfriend.

By then I had already engaged the autopilot so it was flying itself according to the route I programmed. I used the extra time on my hands to venture out of the virtual cockpit to see the beautiful scenery and sequence through the various headings and navigation frecuencies plus the ocassional ATC interaction.

Of course a lot of the time I was on autopilot I had to spend reviewing my enroute and approach charts, checked the weather at the destination and got info on the runway in use to examine the correct set of charts.

Finally some 60nm inbound to Heathrow (just off the coast) the descent was initiated so that I could be at OCK VOR (For the expected OCK1B arrival) by the specified 7000'. Then I contacted the Heathrow Tower North which issued several instructions including descending to 5000' and then 2500' to join the OCK1B arrival. Some traffic in the area so ATC was busy.

The weather was clear and the this simulated summer evening it was still 19:40. On Flickr you can see the pic I took when I was on final approach. Had a lot of ATC chatter on final approach so I was pretty darn busy, luckily I had studied the entire approach procedure from Southampton to Heathrow.

I had new freeware scenery for Heathrow and finally landed on Runway 27R, a perfect landing. Total flight time was 2.6 hours because of adverse wind conditions.

Having completed this, I need to fly another 1:27 hours (in real time) to fulfill the 10 hour requirement for large turboprops before I can move on to Class 4 and "fly" small regional jets such as the Fokker 70 and Embraer 170. In class 4 I get more flying routes to at my disposal but then I will also need to invest 20 hours of flight (in the simulated a/c) before getting the next promotion into my beloved Commercial category (Boeing 737, Airbus 320).

It is a serious hobby, not a game and have learned quite a lot. But of course if you just want to "play" then you don't have to prepare real-life flight plans and examine charts. Then again you will probably be flying offline because online the human ATCs expect you to know what you are doing. I guess that is the difference between the amateur flight simmer and the "professional" flight simmer, it is just how much you want to learn.