Just a note first that “The Chipster” is not sick again or anything like that but only moving house and his internet is off-line for a day or two…so he will be certainly back with us all very soon.

For all of us here at Chaos central it has been quite a roller coaster half-year in one form and another since X-Plane10 went beta and this place certainly lives up to its chaotic name.

 

But boy have we covered some ground in the meantime, so much has passed through our posts it is simply amazing and I feel that the second half of the year will be just as big and full as the this period now gone….boring it hasn’t been – exciting it certainly has.

First off is this week old news but worth repeating, I noted last weekend that there was a Tornado (Aircraft that is) on the way and One Tornado, two Tornado …three and they suddenly out comes another one.

And so X-Alberto (AMX-4) brings another one to the table.

I do admit a formation of these GR4′s would be exciting stuff….

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More of Dan Klaue’s Carenado conversion work has surfaced on the Cessna Grand Caravan C2088: Carenado Incoming Projects

It has got be to be good now – or am I thinking brilliant.

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EGHI Southampton – mercedes : EGHI Southampton 1

How did you know what I was thinking?

To explain that question is that when I was finishing off EGHH Bournemouth scenery for my post last week, I took a small flight in the EC-135 to see if I had any scenery over at Southampton which is a stones throw away from EGHH, I hadn’t (I thought I had) and was disappointed, then within days up comes this EGHI…spooky man!

Certainly both EGHH and EGHI would be a great companions to use together and both will fill in this area from the air very well.

Southampton Airport (IATA: SOU, ICAO: EGHI) is an airport in the UK, located 3.5 NM (6.5 km; 4.0 mi) north north-east of Southampton,^[1] in the Borough of Eastleigh within Hampshire, England.

The airport is owned and operated by BAA, which also owns and operates five other UK airports.

Air France operated by Régional	Seasonal: Lyon [begins 30 June], Nantes [begins 30 June]
Aurigny Air Services	Alderney
Blue Islands	Guernsey, Jersey
Eastern Airways	Aberdeen, Brussels, Durham Tees Valley
Flybe	Alicante, Amsterdam, Avignon, Belfast City, Bergerac, Dublin, Dusseldorf, Edinburgh, Frankfurt, Glasgow-International, Guernsey, Hanover, Jersey, Leeds-Bradford, Limoges, Malaga, Manchester, Newcastle, Paris-Orly, Rennes Seasonal: Béziers, Bordeaux, Brest, Clermont-Ferrand, Faro, Inverness, La Rochelle, Nice, Palma Mallorca, Perpignan, Tours, Verona Charter: Ibiza, Menorca
Isles of Scilly Skybus	Seasonal: Isles of Scilly
Vueling Airlines	Barcelona [begins 23 June]

looking through the above operators it certainly gives you a lot of choice and destinations and that is great for our use.

The history at Southampton Airport is very interesting as well:

The site’s connection with aviation can be traced back to 1910 when pioneer pilot Edwin Rowland Moon used the meadows belonging to North Stoneham Farm as a take-off and landing spot for his monoplane, Moonbeam Mk II.In 2010, the airport arranged a series of events to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the first flight at the airport.

During the First World War, when forces from the United States Navy arrived in 1917, work on the building of hangars began. At the peak of the American presence, some 4,000 officers and men were billeted in tents and huts along the adjacent London to Southampton railway line.

After that war, the site became a transit camp for refugees, mainly Russian, who were anxious to sail to America from the port of Southampton. The shipping companies Cunard and White Star Line (the Oceanic Steam Navigation Company) together with the Canadian Pacific Railway formed the “Atlantic Park Hostel Company” to house them temporarily. In 1921 the hangars were converted into dormitories, kitchens and dining rooms.

The hostel was intended to be a short-term clearing house for those trans-migrants changing ships, but following changes to US immigration law which restricted entry to the United States under national origins quotas, some residents were forced to stay much longer. In 1924 about 980 Ukrainian Jewish would-be emigrants were cared for at the hostel. Some of them were still there seven years later, stranded between the US and UK which would not accept them, and unable to return the countries they had fled. Atlantic Park had a school, library, and synagogue while the refugees formed football teams that played local sides and took part in local events, such as Eastleigh carnival. At the height of its use 20,000 passed through Atlantic Park in 1928 but then figures started to fall away, leading to the closure of the hostel in 1931.

In 1932 Southampton Corporation purchased the site and it became “Southampton Municipal Airport”. By 1935 part of the site was being used by the Fleet Air Arm of the RAF and was briefly known as RAF Eastleigh before it became RAF Southampton in 1936. The military site was transferred to Naval command in 1939 and renamed HMS Raven, and subsequently spent most of the war in a ground and air training role for the Royal Navy.^[8] It eventually passed back into civilian ownership in April 1946.

During the 1950s a mainstay of business for the airport was the Cross channel car ferry service operated by Silver City Airways using Bristol Freighters and Superfreighters. In 1965 a new concrete runway was built, opening for use in 1966, enabling the operation of larger aircraft.

In 1936 Supermarine opened a test flight facility on the site, followed shortly thereafter by the opening of the Cunliffe-Owen Aircraft factory on the southern end of the runway. Both companies later closed their Southampton operations, Supermarine moving flying activities to Chilbolton, and the Cunliffe-Owen factory being acquired by Briggs Motor Bodies during 1949 – 1951^[9] who were taken over by Ford in 1953. This factory is still in use, although now located off-field due to the opening of the M27 motorway in 1983. The Cierva Autogiro Company rented portions of the Cunliffe-Owen plants starting in 1946, and had to move to another location on the field when it was acquired by Briggs. In 1951 Saunders-Roe (commonly abbreviated Saro) took over the interests of Cierva Autogyro and built a rotor testing building on the eastern side of the airfield, which is now derelict. They continued operations on the field until about 1960.

More historic is the fact that on 5 March 1936 the first test flight of the Supermarine Spitfire took place at the airport, an event commemorated in 2004 with the erection of a near-full size sculpture of K5054 the original prototype Spitfire at the road entrance.

This scenery is helped to be above the average as the commercial buildings are excellent,

As is certainly the excellent Premier Inn chain hotel (which is an excellent hotel chain by the way).

here with great detail….

but away from these buildings it then gets a little messy, the roads are very mish-mashy and the great OSM is cut badly with planted trees and part of the runway.

The terminal is totally bland with no activity at all.

but the hangers then make up for some of the shortfalls.

The cargo hub is good as well.

At night the lighting is only average.

with no Global lighting and just a bit of MSFS fill.

So the feeling here is so very similar to EGHH Bournemouth, and that is a very good scenery and with excellent buildings but is also buried by mediocrity.

And that is a real shame as this can be great scenery and very usable. So will I have to bring my knife out again and throw some sprinkle dust on EGHI like I did with EGHH to make it worthwhile?

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SAME – El Plumerillo  Mendoza Argentina – Alessandre : SAME – El Plumerillo

Or to give it its full title….

Governor Francisco Gabrielli International Airport

Try to explain that to your customs agent!

It is famous of course because of Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571, also known less formally as the Andes Flight Disaster, was a chartered airline flight from Montevideo, carrying 45 rugby team members and associates to Santiago (Chile). The aircraft made a stopover at Mendoza Airport and later crashed in the Andes on Friday, October 13, 1972. The last of the 16 remaining survivors were rescued by December 23, 1972.

We get so little scenery for South America that anything is welcome, It is the great unexplored area of X-Plane and any excuse to go down there always make me a little excited, It is like going into the big unknown – and wondering if you will ever come back.

There is not much at SAME but “WOW” look at that view!

Strange arrangement on the ramp, It seems everyone wants to come on one very big plane.

It is a very strange airport.

In the military area that large hangar looks familiar?

It consists of a few hangers and a few French fighter jets.

Nightlighting is well laid out – but there is not much of it.

The cars look like lit up eyes in the darkness, but close up and the textures are quite good.

So really there is not much here to see, and that is a real shame as the scenery around the base of the Andes here is simply spectacular.

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To wrap up this edition “How do you land a Boeing 737-200 on gravel?”

Great talk through there – and only in Canada.

Bye for now Ft56

FT56©2012