Hi Folks,I've been using Active Sky since v4 and it's the one addon I never fly without. My question regards the manner in which weather is set when importing a flight plan from FS. After the plan is processed, the window pops up with the weather for the flight. The arrival airport seems to show the current weather and not the anticipated conditions at my arrival time. Does AS have the ability to show and set the arrival weather based on the TAF for my arrival time? In the case of offline, saved weather; does AS look to the archived weather data for my arrival time as opposed to relying only on the current hour METAR/TAF? Thanks for the help.Regards,Jeff

Hi Jeff,Thanks for your long-standing commitment to us and our products!Before I started answering here I sat back and gave this some thought so here goes.You are correct in that in either Mode, the AS planner is going to use the real time data and not read from the TAFs. Not being a pilot at all, but knowing what little I do know leads me to say that really you want to know both. You want to actually know what the weather is right now, and you want to know what the weather MAY become and that is where the TAF comes into play, as a forecast. So now you can compare actual and TAF and say general things like are conditions going to get worse or better at my destination in the next 6,12,18 hours? But a TAF is only a prediction and may be totally wrong by the time it becomes the METAR. So I think that AS has things right, it uses the METARs and gives the TAFs for weather prediction.Now for very long long flights, pilots are constantly getting updates for their path. We do this also depending on your download intervals. It has been suggested that for a future product that every time AS updates, that the flight plan be updated also, just as it would if you re-submitted the plan. That we will need to wait and see on.Thanks,Jimhttp://www.hifisim.com/banners/hifi-community-sigbanner.jpghttp://www.hifisim.com/

Hi Jim,Wow! Great Answer. Fast too.You're right that the TAF is just a forecast but, keep in mind that that's what we have to work with in the real world too. Generally speaking, in the US at least, a TAF is pretty accurate inside of six to twelve hours out. The reason I asked is that on a recent flight, I had planned for the weather forecast at my arrival time. I arrived a bit too early and the weather hadn't yet changed to the next METAR. It was still virtually identical to the destination weather info that had been generated when the FP was processed. I had expected that as the weather changed; weather systems moved, and so on, that the weather at the airport would show signs that it was moving/changing towards the conditions in the next weather update. With online updates, you would need a mechanism to decode the TAF. I can see where that might be a problem. In the case of offline weather, maybe you could find a way to take the the current time and the flight time, and have the program load the appropriate archive, look at the DAT file for that arrival time, and create a change pattern from the current weather to the arrival weather at the destination. Does any of that make sense? Think of it as: I sit in my plane at airport A from 1200Z to 1500Z. At 1200Z we have KPIT 231126Z 25003KT 3SM BR FEW008 BKN015 BKN110 20/19 A2993 RMK AO2. At 1500Z it looks like this: KPIT 231408Z 19003KT 10SM BKN022 23/18 A2993 RMK AO2. We went from 3 mi in mist to 10 miles and a better ceiling along with a 60dg wind shift. Is there a way to transition between the two so that if I get there a little early the weather is already close to what it will be when the weather updates? Anyhow, great program. I'm glad we have companies like HiFi to support us crazy simmers too. It's a rare thing that customer support actually outshines the product. In the case of ActiveSky, that's a heck of a bar to set. Thanks Jim.Warmest Regards,Jeff

Hi Jeff,Not much we can do right now, but:For our future projects can you write this up as a suggestion and send it to tell-us(AT)hifisim.comWe catalog all suggestions for the future.Thanks,Jimhttp://www.hifisim.com/banners/hifi-community-sigbanner.jpghttp://www.hifisim.com/

Sure Jim, Glad to help.Regards,Jeff