I took a trip from Tromso to Oslo yesterday on Microsoft Flight Simulator 2004. I decided to post a report on my flight here to show you how much work really goes behind making a flight as real as it gets. And perhaps give you a few hints to a successful flight on flightsim as well.
Not only are the flight simulator from Microsoft itself as real as it gets, but the add-on which in this case is represented by a Boeing 737-800 from Precision Manual Development Group (PMDG) is one of the best for flight simulator for its realistic behaviour and systems. So, for me to take a flight to Oslo from Tromso and making it as real as it gets I have t o plan the trip like they do it in real life. I have to check weather, plan the route, flight level and weight and balance.
Today you have many applications which helps simulate the real airlines flight planning procedures. First of all I decide where I want to fly. Now that I have decided to fly fro Tromso to Oslo I check the airlines homepage, in this case, Scandinavian Airlines, what flight number they have on that route. I already knew who flies from here but you can also browse one of the airports you want to fly to and from, they often have a departue/arrival page you can check for flights you can fly. This flight is named SK4437 and is the last flight from Tromso to Oslo this day. So now I have a flight, a destination and an arrival airport. Now it is time to see what the route looks like.
There are several places to find your route and I often check two or three different places, to see if they are more or less the same. If they are similar, you can take them as they are most probably the accurate routes.
Vroute: a program where there excists thousands of real routes. You not only can see the routes, but you get the weather and can see if there will be ATC- coverage en-route as well. A great application. I use this and I recommend it. It is free as well.
RouteFinder: another great way to find your route. Multiple ways to configure your route, via NATS, SID or STARS. This is free as well.
VatAware: if you don`t find your route in any of those apps mentioned above, you may want to check out Vataware. People who fly on Vatsim gets their flights automatically logged on Vataware. Here you can see a satelite image and routes of flights as well as speeds and altitude during flights. Interesting to check this after you have flown a leg to see where you have flown. Free to use!
Flightaware: If you are flying domestic in USA og intercontinental to/from USA, use this page! It is brilliant, because real airline routes are being published here each day. Search for Washington/Dulles Airport and you will see every flight inbound and outbound (on a map) as well as finished flights and planned flights. If you click on a flight you can see planned flight altitude and the whole route. Excellent! Free to use too. I used Vroute and checked to see if anyone on Vataware looked like my route, and they matched. So I choose that one and printed it out. Click the image below to make it larger. 
Route: SID – BDF – UZ201 – EVD – UZ101 – TGA – UM609 – MES – STAR
Next up is to check weather. A must-have when you fly online flightsim is Active Sky. There is a similar setup on the Flight Simulator itself which can download real-weather – but it does not simulate weather or winds aloft data correctly. With Active Sky I can see winds aloft at my planned flight level, so I can calculate more correctly how long time I will use on my trip. It is also useful, especially on longer flights to check real-weather data and forecasts, because Active Sky is that accurate you can use actual aviation weather forecasts. That is what I do now, I go to the Norwegian IPPC to see the metar and terminal forecast (TAF) for Tromso and Oslo.
Metar for ENTC 21005KT 160V250 CAVOK Q1004
Metar for ENGM 03014KT 5000 -SN SCT017
This is just a short summary of the metars, but it shows us the winds at the actual airports so we can find out what runway to expect for takeoff and arrival. At Tromso we will use runway 19 and then we can check what departure we will use. At Gardermoen the wind is blowing from 030 degrees and 14 knots. This tells us that runway 01 will be in use and most likely 01R since 01L is usually the departing runway there. More on why the runways are numbered here. After checking the AIP for Norway and the departures for runway 19 at Tromso, we find that the BDF3B (Bardufoss three bravo) departure will be the one we should use since our route to Oslo starts at BDF. And the arrival for Oslo will be MES4L (Mesnali four lima) since our route ends at MES.
Now we have our route and weather for Tromso and our destination, Oslo, as well as weather en-route. Then it is time to plan the fuel. With the weather en-route figured out, we know how much time we can expect to use down to Oslo. With the winds blowing from an average of 156 degrees at 25 knots in flight level 360 (calculated) we can expect to use around 1 hour and 50 minutes from STD (scheduled time of departure) to STA (scheduled time of arrival) because we will have some headwind. Another important factor for fuel usage is weight. So before we go any further with fuel planning we must first check how high our payload will be. This evening we have 146 guests with plenty of baggage. To make it easier for sim-pilots there is also a great application for planning weight and balance to the aircraft as well as takeoff and landing performance – just like they program pre-flight in real life. It is called Topcat and is worth every penny. 
Now I punch in how many guests there are, how much cargo and so on. Now we get a loadsheet where we can see our weight empty, as well as our total weight with payload and fuel. A load sheet is a flight document which contains flight data or information. It is a mandatory requirement under international and domestic law, that every flight must have a load sheet on board while in flight. I go over to my PMDG fuel planner and enter desired flight level, trip length and a headwind component as well as our payload weight. I automatically receive planned trip fuel and can enter how long we will taxi, burn the APU and how much reserve we want. 
Then I enter the fuel numbers in to the Topcat programme. Now I get my total weight as well as the planned takeoff weight, after having burned fuel on taxiing and APU usage. With these weights calculated I now go and enter what runway I want to use for departure. Then I can download weather and see with FLAP5, ANTI-ICE on and dry runway what engine settings I can use or if I can use de-rated takeoff power and last but not least how much runway I will use. If that was not enough I can also see the engine-out procedures for the selected runway as well. Now I have the complete loadsheet for SK4437 and the takeoff report. I have also made a landing report which lists the runways available at Gardermoen and landing length with different flap- and autobrake settings, v-speeds and runway usage. Now that I have done all that, I can open the Flight Simulator and fire up the 737.
I open Squawkbox which connects me to the Vatsim (Virtual Air Traffic Simulation Network). I then enter my flight number and send in my flightplan (route).
And to make the flight complete we have actual passengers as well, with FsPassengers, to create the right kind of atmosphere. I load up with guests, cargo and fuel by looking at my loadsheet we created before start. I also enter arrival airport and at what time we will arrive. I expect to use 1 hour and 50 minutes. Another great feature with using FsPassengers is that you can expect failures during your flight, either a birdstrike on takeoff or flap/gear issues before landing. So you can receive penalties if you fail to spot any failures during flight.
I enter the route with the complete instrument departure and the route plus weights in my FMC. Then I go to the Performance page in the FMC and enter the desired Assumed temperature which I got from the takeoff report made in Topcat. Now the trim must be filled in, and I see in the FMC the trim here corresponds with the one stated in the loadsheet. So we set the trim for takeoff, 5,3 units. I also check the v-speeds in the FMC against the takeoff report. They are the same and we can now wait for boarding complete from our purser. When boarding is complete I sign another loadsheet and gives it to the gatemanager which releases us and wishes us a nice flight. We say thank you and the purser closes the flight deck door. Now it is time for taxi to runway 19, line up and take off.
After takeoff from Tromso
Cruise at 36 000 feet
The polar express
Inbound ILS 01, poor visibility
Established ILS 01, poor visibility. Metar showed 2400 metres visibility.
FsPassengers flight report.
So there you have it. The flight duration was around 1 hour and 50 minutes not counting time on ground and with the flight planning it was a whole evening. But it is good fun planning such flights. And you can see the whole route from Vataware here. Happy landings!
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