I've been meaning to fly Continental's epic long haul flight from Newark to Hong Kong, and as far as I know this flight usually flies within 100 miles of the North Pole. Really the only reason I want to fly this flight on my sim is the fact that it passes so close to the Pole. However, every time I try to have FS-Navigator plan a route from EWR to HKG, instead of plotting a route over the Pole, it plots a route that runs along Canada and Alaska's northern flanks. Why does it do this? Is FS-Nav not able to plot a polar route? If FS-Nav can't plot a polar route, is there a program that can? Thanks for your help, -Chan

FS cannot fly a true polar route. There is a zone around both polls where you will hit an invisible wall and wont be able to fly straight ahead. GPS will start to act funny also.

Thanks for your quick response. I guess I'll have to fly south of the Pole then.Is this issue limited to FS2004, or is X also affected? Do you know why MS built FS this way? Chan

FSX the same way, because of the geometry involved, a flat land based program trying to deal with a sphere.

FWIW Here was todays COA99 route for KEWR-VHHH.

MERIT HFD PUT PQI J582 UAC 5500N06400W PEPKI 6500N05900W 7000N05800W 7500N05700W 8000N05100W 8500N03600W ABERI B934 BINTA B934 SERNA M520 POLHO G218 TMR B458 WXI A461 LIG R473 WYN W18 NLG W23 ZUH R473 SIERA SIER5A

But like was already mentioned Polar routes are impossible in FS2004

There is an invisible wall at N89.5* that will stop you even though you will maintain airspeed. But a polar route does not have to pass right over the pole, it just covers very high latitudes.What I have also noted is that if your longitude is changing as well the ground appears to move east-west at a very high rate. I'm not sure if this is just a visual glitch.You must also keep in mind that at high latitudes your magnetic compass will be way off and that you should fly on true headings.Also note that the map display will be very distorted at high latitudes due the FS's map projection.Here is how the great circle track looks from 'above': http://www.gcmap.com...c3&MS=wls&DU=nm I did a quick test by flying the northernmost part of KEWR-VHHH and the plane followed the GPS track well.And the greatcircle between the departure and destination

Just FYI, MSFS sees the world as a cylinder, not as a sphere.db.

I remember well my attempt to fly Concorde over the pole many years ago. Flying at Mach 2 sideways and not getting anywhere is interesting to say the least!

Looks like this one might be within tolerance: (KEWR) GREKI V419 JUDDS CAM MT J482 HENDY 5500N 07300W 6500N 06800W 7000N 06500W 7500N 06100W 8000N 05600W 8500N 04000W ABERI B934 BINTA B934 SERNA M520 POLHO G218 TMR B458 WXI A461 LIG R473 WYN W18 NLG W23 ZUH R473 SIERA SIER5A (VHHH)

Wow thanks for all the responses. I'll have to try that last route out and see if it works.

Wow thanks for all the responses. I'll have to try that last route out and see if it works.

Hope to get a response! I also wanna do this flight one day

FWIW: If you don't get routes with NATS or PACS coordinates FSBuild downloads them for use in its auto route feature. PACS are mostly fixed but NATS vary daily. It will be up to the user to determine if the coordinates are within the latitude limits of the FS world.

BTW, FSX does not have this problem; you can fly right over the pole. It uses a round earth model. Hope this helps,