Welcome back hooligans for the next installment of the Bush League Backcountry Fly-In Series!, Join us at a special day of the week (due to the Labor Day holiday in the U.S.) on Tuesday, September 8, 2020 at 8:00PM EDT (1200z, Sept. 9) for part 10. This month’s group flight finds us in the central plains of Kansas and Oklahoma for the first ever River Run event. We’ll plan on departing K50 Cook Airfield just outside of Witchia, KS Class Charlie airspace. After takeoff, head due west for about 2 miles… when you reach the Arkansas River, follow it south!
You’ll be looking for sandbars… 26 sandbars to land on as you travel approximately 75 river miles south to Kaw Lake. Be sure to drop down low in the river channel and be on the lookout for “sail flags” that identify each of the 26 sandbars. The sail flags will look like this. On one side is a number identifying all 26 special sandbars, numbered in sequence from north to south, and on the other side is… a clue. This is the game within the game. There’s 27 answers I’m looking for! If you think you’ve solved the puzzle, send me a private message on my discord channel.
Fly low, fly slow, and don’t feel like you need to complete then entire flight during one session. If you’re a helo pilot, you’ll love skimming above the tree tops and below the power lines! Also, when over the river, we encourage you to keep to the right-hand side unless on approach to a sandbar. Announce your landing and departing intentions on 122.8. After you’ve had enough of the white knuckle flying along the Arkansas River, you can bail out and stop off for a rest at 55K Oxford (optional), but continue on down the river and we’ll plan on meeting around 10:00pm EDT at “27OK Thomas Landing” just west of Kaw Lake to debrief everyone’s progress before we call it a night. Good luck finding 27OK! Again, this is designed to NOT finish during the initial group flight.
A few usual logistics…
Everyone is welcomed! Whether you’re an expert or beginner with flying simulators, radio communications, or navigation, etc., you’re invited! We’re a friendly bunch and enjoy learning from each other.
All of the scenery and recommended aircraft is based on X-Plane 11.41, but tested with 11.50r2.
You can fly whatever aircraft you’d like, however, we’d like to suggest a small, STOL capable plane as some of the sandbars are very short. Big bush tires would be a good idea!
You’ll want to review the sectional for the area, available from www.skyvector.com so you’ll have an idea of where the starting and ending airfields are located.
We encourage you to join the VATSIM network and use the CTAF frequency of 122.8 to announce positions. Several CSL files are available to correctly render other aircraft.
We’ll also use the Downwindsim Discord voice channel during the flight for non-ATC related chit-chat.
Scenery links:
Unzip these in your X-Plane/Custom Scenery folder…
K50 Cook Airfield
55K Oxford
Arkansas River Sandbars
27OK Thomas Landing (version 2 with tree excludes)
See the notes below for the OSM files…
Arkansas River OSM Ortho4XP files
Scenery Notes:
Ortho4XP is a necessity on this adventure. The imagery, the river channel, and the sandbars are based on Bing Imagery, zoom level 16. On this flight we’ll be flying in tiles +37-097, +37-098, +36-097, +36-098. This flight was designed based on these settings for these tiles in the USA. The OSM files go in their respective Ortho4XP scenery folders… make sure you recook the tiles with the modified OSM files! Here’s a link to a video tutorial I made to help explain the process.
If you get stuck or have a question, drop a message on the DownwindSim Discord bush-flying text channel. We’ll be happy to help and we look forward to have you join us on the Bush League Backcounty Fly-In Series! Don’t forget your life jacket and swim suit!