So far Career Mode has been fairly excellent at creating Cargo and Charter missions, there are always so many to choose from that you are never at a loss for where to fly next. I know a lot of folks dislike the 2024 career mode in general, but as a 'mission generator' its definitely fully functioning as long as you take the time to set up the flight plan correctly (I'd say 90% of the time the FL is way too high or the approach/arrival needs to be changed). There's never been a point where I've cleared off or finished all those mission types, more generate all the time.

I cannot seem to figure out what generates SAR missions and how frequently that happens. I had 4 appear this weekend, two in the Nevada desert area and 2 in South America, I want to say near Chile/Bolivia. Once I cleared those out on Saturday, I expected more to generate for Sunday but nope. On the Firefighting side, I did finally see about a dozen or so spread out over the world, but SAR was so few I thought something might be broken. I thought that, as you do them, more would generate.

I do not have the helicopter Certifications, but that shouldn't matter for Plane SAR missions. Figures I make my 3rd company for SAR only to have no missions generating, or generating in areas I haven't uncovered. I've dumped a lot of credits into just hopping around with my pilot from airport to airport to remove the fog which is also ridiculous that isn't a better method for that. I have most of South America, Southern USA, all of Europe, most of Canada completely uncovered - I've got about half of Australia uncovered as well. Never seen any SAR in Australia or Europe. Only ever seen SAR missions in desert areas as well, nothing spawning in any snowy or forested areas. I know about the "Hot Spot" map on the company page and I went to and unlocked all those areas as well.

Super frustrating as SAR missions in the Draco are currently my jam - been watching STOL competitions on Youtube and spent a bunch of time this past weekend practicing beach/dirt landings, trying to learn how to approach from a steeper AOA and use Beta to stop without diving my nose into the ground. Completing those 4 SAR missions that did show up was quite exciting too, it's a very fun mission type that pretty much guarantees variety since you aren't following any charts or RNAV or ILS, the ground conditions can be very challenging. In some cases you need to make a judgement call - if you cannot land close by, you have to land nearby and taxi over. Or get out and walk over to trigger the cutscene. The Searching part is some of the most fun I've had in MSFS; catching a glimpse of the target flashing a mirror reflector at you (and you wondering if its a texture glitch) then flying over to confirm your hunch and spotting the car, all very satisfying.

Some QOL wishes - While I haven't run into a mission that was impossible to get close to the target, I have read other posts, especially with helicopter SAR, where the landing area is entirely impossible/uneven. In those cases, a "CLOSE BY" rating would help; if you can land 0.5nm/1nm/2nm away, you get points deducted for how far away you're forced to land, but the mission is still doable. All 6 or 7 of the missions I've done now were desert landings; it would be nice to have missions generate in other environments. I do wonder if the plane missions simply do not spawn everywhere so that the game can better manage the generation of the scenery and make sure there is enough clear space to land. One of the desert missions was rockier than the others and I'd swear the game carved/smoothed out a patch of rocks near the target that I was able to land on. Would love to see more beach landings. Or water landings in general to help stranded boaters.

Don't know how others here are making out with SAR missions, if there's guys here even trying to do them. It is truly frustrating how Asobo can build something fun but then lock it to the career mode and hide all the information around generation. I'd love to have a Free Flight SAR mode; just generate the mission, spawn the guy and let me try to pick him up, points for search speed and landing distance to target.

If it's any consolation we have these same issues on mission and in grid regularly :)

Some mission type variety would be nice too. I think that a rudimentary Scouting type of SAR mission would be a great; where you don't need to land, but the focus is on getting to a crash site and identifying possible survivors/fire hazards etc, that you'd communicate over radio to have dispatch send the right secondary team out. Even have them linked - Scouting mission has you fly to a crash site and scan the area for survivors, lets say you locate some. Fly back and the next mission has you fly out to the crash site to rescue them, now that you know the situation and can prepare better; maybe you cannot take a plane and need to go out in a helicopter. Maybe you spotted multiple injured and need to get out there and land a 208 and branch into a Medivac situation. Maybe the plane crash started a forest fire and now a firefighting mission is required once you chopper the survivors to safety.

You can see the bones of such a system are there in the game already, just need someone to make a mod or mission pack, cause Asobo sure wont.

1 hour ago, Flyfaster_MTN002 said:

If it's any consolation we have these same issues on mission and in grid regularly :)

As an IRL SAR pilot, do you find the plane missions underwhelming? I'm guessing the helicopter ones are more challenging and especially with the hoist, I suspect those are the most difficult mission types (mind you I can barely hover at all with assistances off, I cant imagine how difficult it is in actual weather or at higher altitudes)

3 hours ago, Kristofski said:

As an IRL SAR pilot, do you find the plane missions underwhelming? I'm guessing the helicopter ones are more challenging and especially with the hoist, I suspect those are the most difficult mission types (mind you I can barely hover at all with assistances off, I cant imagine how difficult it is in actual weather or at higher altitudes)

Have not had a chance to upgrade to MSFS2024 yet so can't comment.

If the goal is to replicate a SAREX, just get a sectional (preferably marked in grids) or download the aforementioned using any EFB. Locate a small known former crashed aircraft or similar and try to navigate to it, and then visually find it at various altitudes...

You can try different search methods based on the topography, weather, etc.