The morning after flying my PC-12 over to Silver Creek from Anchorage, the day breaks bright and clear (and a small surprise in that we got a dusting of snow - sorry, was just testing my winter textures with JSGME). We also get our first look at the gorgeous Shade Tree Micro Aviation A-1A Husky sporting a pair of tundra tires and retractable skis. (Purchase the STMA Husky: HERE!). The 180hp Husky is the perfect Alaska bush plane. The STMA variants include regular wheels (with and without wheel pants), tundra wheels, skis, and floats. You can also mount a belly cargo pod for additional carrying capacity.
Our flight today is a glacier flying tutorial that is part of the Ultimate Glacier Pilot Adventure Package. We will take off from Silver City and proceed (following instructions) to the UXTG training glacier strip. I put the airport identifier in the GPS for reference…
The beauty of flying aircraft such as the Husky is that it is really basic, and all stick and rudder. Turn the fuel on, battery on, mixture rich, prime, starter…and you are ready to go!
The UGP (Ultimate Glacier Pilot) training features (of course) custom scenery and an excellent use of a cockpit script to give you pointers and instructions. This is exactly the type of stuff I think our civil side simulators need - reasons to fly and thing to do - I love it! The instructions indicate what you are supposed to do, then you cycle the script (you can map it to a button on your stick if you like) to the next instruction…
In addition to the text script, you can choose varying levels of additional aids - in this case I used the full tutorial features that paint click spots and arrows that are drawn on the terrain where you are supposed to cycle the instructions.What a great use of X-Plane’s scripting capabilities!
With a notch of flaps we head skyward with instructions to enter a left downwind, then crosswind to pick up the rest of the route…
East of the field, large arrows are drawn on the terrain to indicate our direction of travel. At each “CLICK” spot we receive further instructions…
Throughout the tutorial there are helpful tips that give some basic insights into glacier flying…
Into a mountain pass we go…
The flight through the mountains is short, and soon we have the training glacier strip in sight. It is marked up with additional aids and reference points…
The goal is to land on the green LAND as opposed to the orange or red ones…
After touching down on the skis, a bit of power is required to climb the slope to the hut at the top of the strip…
Success!
After a brief stop for some hot chocolate at the hut, we head back over to Silver City. Though the training is basic, I love the use of the cockpit checklist files to cycle through the instructions and the custom terrain markings (which can be turned on and off) are a great instructional tool. Nice job by the creators of Ultimate Glacier Pilot!
BeachAV8R