Round the World Tour - Part Eight - England

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NOTE: This edition of the rules includes the full text of Tornado's NOTAM #2. This Notice to Airmen includes specific restrictions on air space usage around the destination airport, Heathrow.

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This is the seventh thread in the Round the World Challenge series. We start a new thread when the old one gets to around fifty posts or so in order to make the topic easy-to-follow for everyone. To find out how this flight got started, follow these threads, in order:http://ftp.avsim.com/dcforum/DCForumID8/7103.htmlhttp://ftp.avsim.com/dcforum/DCForumID8/7301.htmlhttp://ftp.avsim.com/dcforum/DCForumID8/7345.htmlhttp://ftp.avsim.com/dcforum/DCForumID8/7399.htmlhttp://ftp.avsim.com/dcforum/DCForumID8/7433.htmlhttp://ftp.avsim.com/dcforum/DCForumID8/7478.htmlhttp://ftp.avsim.com/dcforum/DCForumID8/7536.htmlThe Challenge was started by Tornado Wilkes.Have you ever wanted to fly around the world, but never had the time? Here's your opportunity to take part in a team effort.RULESOn 15 July 2002 (UTC), one intrepid volunteer started the RTW challenge departing Heathrow in Real World Weather. For each pilot, its up to them which way they go, however they must complete a flight of between around 1 and 2 1/2 hour duration. As soon as the leg is completed, they must post a message (with 1 screen shot - no more) on this thread and tell us exactly which Airport (inc. ICAO code) they finished at (N.B. each leg must finish on a runway).PICKING UP THE BATONAnyone wishing to take up the next leg, must reply to that "location post" simply stating that they "have the baton" (in disputes it is the first volunteer that posted who is chosen) and the challenge continues. The pilot with the baton has 3 hours to get back to the forum and post their PIREP and screenshot. If they have not returned in 3 hours, anybody may lay claim to the baton, starting at the previous departing airport -- thus making the current baton-holder's flight null-and-void. However, the 3 hour rule is flexible. If a pilot takes 3 hours and 10 minutes and nobody has laid claim to the baton, the flight is considered valid. BUT if someone claims the baton after 3 hours 5 minutes, the poor baton-holder's flight is null and void. In such circumstances, any subsequent location report posted with regard to the original flight, is deemed null and void. You may not "pick up the baton" in advance.NOTAM #1 by Tornado Wilkes here: http://ftp.avsim.com/cgi-bin/dcforum/dcboa...ewmode=threadedNOTAM #2 by Tornado Wilkes:As a security measure, the TWAA has announced that all non business related flights approaching within a 30 mile radius of Heathrow over the next month, must have an escort of at least two fighter jets. Furthermore photographic evidence of the escort must be presented to security, when booking in at the gate. Failure to comply will result in your craft being shot down.Thank you for your co-operation. :DTHE THREE STRIKE RULEThe following activities will earn you a strike.A. Failure to deliver a single screen shotB. Failure to go in a sensible direction (as judged by the flaming community although the challenge still continues from where you finished)C. Failure to use real weather -- either MSFS built-in, or FSMeteo (or work-alikes)D. Failure to Travel a distance that is in keeping with the aircraft chosen and weather. This means no slewing, no speeding up the simulation rate, no fiddling with your aircraft's .air file, etc.E. Attempting to steer or direct the flight whilst not in possession of the batonIf you earn three strikes, you are disqualified for the rest of the event.AIRCRAFTOnly the following aircraft (by any developer) may be used for this challenge:Turboprops (Single or Multi)Props (Single or Multi)HelicoptersBalloons (including blimps)NAVIGATION/ TIME OF DAYUse whatever devices you wish, and at whichever Time of Day you choose FINALLY.......Good luck all, this is our opportunity to prove that "the whole is greater than the sum of its parts" Tornado Wilkes

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The baton is currently in the air being carried by btd_jfk, who claimed the baton from EGCF at 4:22AM EDT. By his own word, his expected arrival location is .... .... .... EGCF.If you have not yet reviewed NOTAM #2, please scroll up and read it. It's nestled midway through the listing of rules above, and can also be found here:http://ftp.avsim.com/cgi-bin/dcforum/dcboa...ewmode=threadedThank you.--Tony

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Well folks, as I won't get home from work for another 11 hours or so and I assume "our" goal will have been reached by then let me say...It's been a blast. I successfully flew 2 (maybe 3?) flight segments in a part of the world I'd never thought to go before. Good luck to the final "baton carrier" and the armada that will join him/her. Many thanks to those that planned, organized, refereed this event and I look forward to the next time we can all get together again.John VanAmerican Virtual Airlines

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Yeah, I'm such an order-freak that I wanted to make a separate posting for each topic - one for rules, one for Location Post, and one for separate comments.Wow, we're now over England! Who'd-a thunk it!? We've come quite a long way, and I don't mean just in terms of miles. Think back to the first day or two, when I wasn't sure there would be enough interest to get us anywhere at all. Back then, our map-maker had never done any graphics work - now he's doing aircraft repaints! Confusion ensued because of the tricky nuances of doing this through a threaded message board, so we all learned to read things more carefully and try to keep better track of what was going on -- resulting in a nearly flawless second-half of the journey (in case nobody realized that). Hopefully, the skills we've learned this time around will leave everyone energized and ready for the Pro version of the challenge, which Tornado alluded to in an earlier post.Thanks to everyone for participating, for not being afraid to ask questions, for being so gracious about those nasty strikes, and for having fun.Thanks very much to Michael for doing the wonderful maps, leg listings, and his special package which I'm eager to see.Finally, a special thanks to Tornado Wilkes, who started this whole thing and who has acted as both a guide and a cheerleader (though hopefully without the mini-skirt!).If the final flight hasn't happened by the time I get home from work today, have a good one. Otherwise, I'll see you IN THE AIR!--TonyP.S. - I thought you might like to see an "Alternate Reality" version of history. Here is a look at what the final map looked like from the Flightsim.com version of the Challenge. Note they had a different landing requirement...they did not have to hit San Diego -- the slackers! :)

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I sat on the ground at EGCF for an hour and a half waiting to see if there would be a ruling on the issue and then decided to take off with the baton and do my mandatory flying, i rented a lil cessna 172 to fly me to the coast and back, and other than a very windy departure the flight was more of a sightseeing one than anything else, although the ennglish countryside doesnt have too much to look at in this area...ohh wellI swung around after reaching the North Sea and flew back in to EGCF to another windy landing, flying 55 minutes and using 8 gallons of fuel, only to find out that i am wanted by the authorities, gee i wish i had flown to the American Embassy...but things seem to dramatic there. I'll drop the baton here and wait for my consquences the baton is down at EGCF. I need to go find some lawyers and prepare a crack defense before they all go off for tea.P.S. I filed this pirep as late as possible as to provide as much time as possible for a decision to be made

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i have the batoni have the baton again, taking advantage of a loophole in the rules( no provision in the rules for not going back to back on leg, THIS MUST BE CLEARED UP WITH A NOTAM IN MY OPINION IN ANY FUTURE EVENTS OF THIS NATURE!) and have no intentions on flying anywhere near heathrow or much farther from where i have landed. in fact i plan to fly a loop back to where i landed. i want confirmation on what the final leg will be before i relinquish it, i would like to see open discussion in the forums on the matter to avoid what happened in the flightsim version of this event. This desire left me with two options (A)file a pirep and not a location post and then contest the flights of whoever picked up the baton as the rules state that in order to pick up a baton you must reply to a location post. (B)Claim the baton for myself upon landing.The decsion to keep the baton was not made until after i had landed and posted the first pirep and i wanted to give up the baton the second time but upon landing and posting a pirep decided to keep it. I am willing to host a multiplayer session myself, but i have no experience, although i am willing to learn. but most importantly i would like to see what everyone wants to do before i hand off the baton to the final holder. I have been up over 24 hours,:-zhelp so i would love a speedy resolution to the matter. After reviewing the constitution, it seems to me the spirit of the constitution is that 'everyone gets to the share the flying' My withholding of the baton isnt in my interest but to allow as many ppl to share in flying what could be the final leg of this incredible journey. If my flights are declared unconstituional it would be the same as if they had been ruled valid because the baton would still be at EGCF. I am imploring everyone who has particapted to put input into the upcoming leg(s). A consensus of at least 5 people who have particapted would be nice but at least three, one the baton holder and two military escorts is defintely essential. If the community feels i should give up the baton without an agreement having been made on how to continue then i will defintely comply readilyI am putting on the asbestos for the flames, but have done this in the best interest of everyone who has particapated in the event, i repeat, i will not take the baton on to heathrow, and will post a pirep to relinguish the baton as soon as i understand how the final flight will come off. Thanks all!

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Hi, I have followed this with interest both at work and at home, (my home system went haywire last week and I have only just gotFS2K2 back so have been unable to join in) Congratulations to everyone who has participated, what a spectacular idea and to think the world wide cooperation to make it work.Just to warn you if you plan EGCC, Manchester, the Commonwealth Games are opening in 24 hours and the Queen is in the area, she is also to open EGGP, (Liverpool John Lennon) Tomorrow morning. You should have landed by then though.If I am at home later I may try to join in the final approach.Good LuckTerry

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I promise...this is the last post from me right now this morning. I HAVE to get to work. :)BDT_JFK commented:"i want confirmation on what the final leg will be before i relinquish it, hopefully from scabbo our ump, or at least some guidance from our RTW community" I wanted to clarify that the rules and NOTAM's, as well as my interpretation of the latter, are posted in the previous thread. Any decisions about, and coordination of, the final flight will definitely have to come from the community of pilots.Have fun working it out.--Tony

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Hy!Thankfully I can post at work (being the internet-admin may help... :-wink2 ).As I can read in the previous posts, most of us (IMHO) want

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>- The multiplayer flight should be hostet by lhaso. He >volunteered for it multiple times. >- The exact time and details of this flight should be posted >by lhaso (if he could think of us "poor" europeans who have >to stay up the whole night, we will be veeery happy! ;-) ). I don't disagree -- if Ihaso (is this Michael, I keep forgetting the "real" names?) wants to host, let him do so. I will, however, note again that I can host as well, having the equipment and capacity to do so (I believe). I would even stay out of the flight, leaving as much room for everyone else (unless there's room for one more :>) I am off work here at 3pm PST (um, not sure how that translates into world time but you do the math) and would be glad to schedule it as per the consensus here.Someone, however, should decide pretty soon: we don't want to run out of gas and have a crash up there. LOL.

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There is only one baton.Additional batons aren't added to the challenge. As I read the NOTAM, there can be as many additional planes in the air as there are people who wish to join. Two of those planes must be jet fighters. We have one volunteer for a jet flyer already.3PM Pacific = 6PM Eastern = 11PM GMTFinally, while I doubt we'll get even 16 people together (meaning nobody has to sit out the flight), there is a freeware add-on for FS2002 that replaces the built-in multiplayer hosting facility. I don't recall the name of the program. It was mentioned in the final thread of the Round the World Challenge over in the Flightsim.com 2002 forum, if anyone has time to look for it (I'm at work at the moment, so this is but the briefest of breaks). It is probably also in the AVSim library.--Tony

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Well after telling my story to the locals here at a nearby pub, they have agreed to help me watch the baton. Since i only go up for a one hour flight when i get down i take a 90 minute nap and then get ready and back in the plane for my one hour circle. The have been so kind to set up a cot for me in the house of a kind elderly woman just a few minutes away, she makes some great mutton! And to top it all off they have someone posted at the door for a couple of reasons, first to make sure i dont oversleep and second to make sure nobody tries to grab the baton and all for free, they feel the publicity their airfiled is getting is worth it. They have also let me rent the Cessna i am using for circling for free! When not in the air the baton is tucked away on my person, and will probably remain so for quite some time.I got up in the air around midday dealing with the same wind gust i have been all day, deaprting and arriving into this airport is a nightmare! but once up in the air all is peaceful as i cruise about sightseeing at 3500 feet. This time i headed due west towards Wales, and i noticed more buildings below me than when i had went east. After a half hour and falling short of Wales i headed back to another uneasy landing at EGCF, i might have to switch planes if the landings stay this rough...i wonder if my host will allow it? 1 hour of flight ant 10 gallons of fuel. I better call home the family and tell them i am okay. The Baton is at EGCF

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i Have the batonI have emailed with lhaso and i believe it is only fitting that he host the multiplayer event, however he will not be available until 5-6 pm eastern time, so that means i am gonna have to take it up there at least three more times until then and it is exhausting work.BUT i am very happy to see progress i think we can all agree that there will be a multiplayer flight around 6pm EST most likey hosted by lhaso, i will hold the baton until such flight is ready(not directing the flight since i have the baton) That is if i am able to get in after the location post. That there should be two military batons up for grabs at random times...the question is who will post the military batons. (i'll volunteer if i am not sleeping, lol) The military baton thing was more of an unoffical thing but i can see why that would be illeagl Another problem is that EGCF is a small field with no taxiways just a grass parking area, maybe i should move the baton to a bigger airport to accomodate more planes, i feel that would be like taking and unfair extra leg but who knows its up to you guys

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Scabbo...Do you have an URL to the forum at Flightsim.com...? As I'm doing vacation replacement this week at work I have time to "browse" while handling calls.Hawkeyez :-kewl

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Just out of a matter of interest, further to NOTAM #1, neither of the recent location posts clearly identifies the destination, which if landing back at the original airport is known as "local."As such, if anyone is confused........... Scabbo?????? ;-)If any of you come over Birmingham on the way down, give me a wave. Im sitting in an office block on the M5/M6 interchange.