Blade Edge

Man, Igor may have missed us, but you could feel his wrath in the air today that’s for sure! Never had to deal with so much damn turbulence while flying – it got to the point of being just plain annoying, especially in the helicopter which is already difficult enough to manage. But I rode it all out and got where I wanted to go today.

I picked up some awesome HD textures for the default Bell 206B from the OZx community and they are pretty great. I mean if the shot I featured above doesn’t convince you, then check out a before and after comparison of the virtual cockpit textures. Plus, I found my favorite black/yellow/white paint scheme in HD to boot. Additionally, I also  installed FS Water Configurator and the HD wave textures from Striking Software to beef up the water even further. I also downloaded a new traffic database for Ultimate Traffic 2 to increase the amount of general aviation traffic.

I decided to humor ATC for my departure and arrival while flying the 206B, so I contacted Long Island (KISP) Ground and requested a runway taxi, the proceeded to fly along the taxiways assigned to me while trying to stay less than 100 feet off the ground. I only got yelled at by ATC twice for taking off without clearance, but besides staying below 100 feet I also had trouble making the chopper go where I wanted it. It always seemed to want to slide off to the side instead of just fly straight forwards. But I made it to the runway, contacted the tower and got my clearance okay, so it worked at least. Arriving at Morristown (KMMU) I made to land at Runway 5 and just as I was turning base this Piper Cub comes whizzing past me! Good lord that’s the second close encounter in two days, and this one was like 150 feet off my bow! Apparently the cub was taking off from the runway I was landing on – good job ATC! After landing on the runway, it took me long enough to hover taxi off that ATC instructed me to go around to clear the runway for incoming traffic – luckily I touched down on the taxiway just as they told me this and instructed me to contact Ground instead, so I did and got my taxi to parking instructions.

Departing from KMMU in the Cessna, I flew via the Robbinsville VOR down south to McGuire AFB (KWRI), dealing with more turbulence almost the whole way – there were periods of calm here and there, but then I would start bouncing about again and sometimes a gust of wind would push me a good 5 degrees off course for a second. McGuire directed me to enter the pattern left downwind for Runway 6, although the real-life airport diagram shows that runway is still under construction – whatever, it’ll be finished someday so why not today?? I then taxied around looking for parking and finally just parked at the fuel pump. I’ll have to see if I can dig up some scenery for this place because the default scenery is extremely lacking.

So now I’m at a military airport hmmm?? That leaves me with some interesting options…