From Vienna to Skiathos in the JustFlight Avro Vulcan in Microsoft Flight Simulator
The one where I join a group flight with MyAir and fly among the commercial traffic for the evening.
This evening I took the JustFlight Avro Vulcan out for a group flight with my friends at MyAir - really as an excuse to try out the guidance systems when using GPS. All sorts of lessons were learned along the way.
The flight plan was as follows:
LOWW STEI3C SME BAREB TUVAR ODLET VABEK UL603 OLOTA MAKED TSL1C LGSK
End-to-end, the route was 660 nautical miles, and involved both a standard instrument departure, and standard terminal arrival route - both of which were programmed into the GPS via the “World Map” in the simulator - therefore appearing automagically within the GPS when powered up in the aircraft.
The aircraft was fully fueled, with extra fuel available in bomb-bay tanks if needed (it turned out we didn’t need it in the end, but always safe to have an extra reserve!).
Before take-off, the flight directors were pre-configured to track the GPS route, and a plan mentally sketched out to control climb and airspeed on departure.
After joining the queue for departure at Schwechat, Tower gave XL361 clearance for takeoff, and everybody got to hear the famous howl as the Vulcan thundered down the runway and rotated for the sky at 150 knots.
After completing the initial climbing turn at full throttle, we climbed through 3000ft at 220 knots, pulled the throttles back to 90%, and engaged the autopilot, configured for IAS and GPS tracking, with the STEI3C SID to follow.
We were initially cleared out to 15,000ft, then 25,000ft, and finally to cruise at 35,000ft. Once configured, the aircraft performed flawlessly, and more efficiently than anticipated. Much of the route was spent with the engines at 80%, cruising along at about Mach 0.75.
Descent into Skiathos began at 90 miles out, while approaching the Thessaloniki VOR - the beginning of the TSL1C STAR. IAS mode was chosen on the autopilot to control descent - regulating to power to maintain between 2500 and 3000ft per minute down to 4000ft at the Skopelos VOR. Descent was paused at 10,000ft to lower airspeed - first to 250 knots, then to 185 knots over Skopelos as directed by air traffic services.
Turning over Skiathos, the autopilot disengaged - without an audible warning. Air traffic services immediately noticed the departure from the plan and called as I took control of the aircraft and got in back on track.
Due to separation concerns while flying the SID into Skiathos, I was vectored to extend the down-wind leg out over the bay to the south, before turning back in, confirming airfield in-sight, and being transferred to tower.
The aircraft ahead of me (another Vulcan) had run long on the runway, and was waiting before back-tracking for my arrival. Knowing that we only had 5000ft of runway to play with, I came in relatively slowly - at perhaps 130 knots at touchdown - and planted the undercarriage before engaging wheel brakes and deploying braking parachutes. We stopped after about 3500ft - which became all the more surprising given that we had only used 50% of the fuel carried by the aircraft, and hadn’t touched the reserves in the bomb bay.
The take-aways? A good deal of forward planning needs to go into strategies when flying precision procedures in commercial airspace. To control, speed, altitude, and direction to the standards required is not straightforward. Steep turns (as happened over Thessaloniki) can and will deactivate the Autopilot. It tends to lag behind the flight directors, and if the disparity becomes too large, it will disconnect. Finally, it became obvious that the Vulcan can fly well over a thousand nautical miles on a full fuel load, if managed carefully.
During the first half of the flight (which lasted several hours) we were accompanied by a number of other Vulcans that flew some of the route in and among the group. They did not appear on our ATC tracking (using Transmitter and LittleNavMap), and couldn’t be raised on Discord either - which was a huge shame - they missed out on either listening in, or taking part in the radio communications that took place during the flight.
MyAir are a great bunch, and often advertise themselves as a relaxed on-ramp to the world of air traffic services. As was seen this evening - they had no problem at all with me flying the Vulcan in-among their usual traffic. I often think the key is to remain respectful of the instructions for the flight, and to see meeting them as a challenge rather than anything onerous.
So - I’ve completed my first controlled flight using GPS in the Vulcan! All we need now is a group flight involving 11 Handley Page Victors, and we can re-create the flight from RAF Waddington to Port Stanley in the Falkland Islands!