I - Cloud9's Purpose
Cloud9's last scenery developed for FS9 was not a big hub, but a historical medium airport located on America’s east coast. This add-on will allow you to try very particular and challenging approaches over the sky of the US Capital.
II - Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport - DCA
Opened in 1941, the Ronald Regan Washington National Airport (KDCA) is located in Arlington County, Virginia, about 4 miles outside Washington DC downtown, along Potomac riverside. It was originally designed with a main terminal and four runways based on architectural references of both Colonial and Neoclassical styles. After some years, the runway 9/27 was closed and became taxiway Alpha and a parking area.
Despite several expansions over the last 65 years, its proximity to one of the world’s most important political center has always demanded concerns over national safety and noise abatement control, and the need to restrain its growth.
Therefore, the Federal Aviation Administration (F.A.A.) established the “Perimeter Rule”, restricting nonstop services to destinations within a 1,250 mile perimeter from Washington DC. Since the year 2000, the federal government has granted six exceptions to this rule, allowing daily flights to: Denver, Las Vegas, Los Angeles, Phoenix, Salt Lake and Seattle.
Meanwhile, this airport has been subject to special security procedures since most of central Washington is restricted airspace up to 18,000 feet, affecting take off and approach procedures.
Pilots are required to follow the path of Potomac and Anacostia Rivers within 5 miles from KDCA, in an effort to avoid flying over some monuments as wells as political and military facilities. Take off patterns demand power thrust reduction since 1,500 feet, enough for a 500 fps climb, until reaching 10 miles of distance. The nighttime flights from 10 p.m. to 7 a.m. are only authorized for specific aircraft types.
Regarded as one of the most interesting approaches in the United States territory, the “River Visual Rwy 19” is only authorized with a ceiling of at least 3,500 feet and visibility higher than of 3 mile. This procedure follows the Potomac River, which closest bridges to the airport are lightened in order to aid navigation. Shortly before landing, there is a steep right turn, aligning the aircraft to the southbound runway. Passengers on the left side of the aircraft get a fantastic view of the Capitol, Washington Monument, Jefferson Memorial and the White House. At the same time, on the right side, they are able to see the the Pentagon, Arlington National Cemetery and the United States Air Force Memorial.
As a result of September 11th terrorist attacks, which closed this airport for 23 days, it has been subjected to stricter security measures. Only aircrafts with less than 156 seats are allowed to access the airport, private planes are banned (with rare exceptions), and general aviation is authorized on a limit basis (48 operations per day under serious restrictions). Recently, some even stiffer regulations have been abandoned.
In 2005, Washington National Airport reached a new record of 17,8 million passengers served on 276,056 operations. On the other hand, there has been a reduction tendency of cargo transportation (freight and mail); six times less over the past ten years.
Nowadays, it offers nonstop service to 70 destinations, with an average of 762 daily operations, comprehended mostly of domestic flights (mainly air shuttles services to New York and Boston) and some international flights to Toronto and Montreal, in Canada, as well as Bahamas (Nassau) and Bermuda.
US Airways is the largest carrier at KDCA, accounting for roughly 35% of passenger traffic, followed by American Airlines, the second largest, for 14%. Another eleven airlines are also serving: Air Canada, Air Tran, Alaska Airlines, America West, ATA, Continental, Delta, Frontier, Midwest, Northwest and United Airlines.
III - Cloud9's Scenery
Cloud9 team has repeated with this scenery its success philosophy of not compromising framerate despite of the high level of detail achieved.
Developed based on real in-flight and ground pictures, its top quality can be seen in each detail, such as the realistic ground textures with seasonal effects, precise reproduction of runways and taxiways, realistic night effects, buildings designed with 3D Studio Max, dynamic cars, service trucks and trains on the landside, customized AI traffic layout, completely integrated in the surroundings area terrain (compatible with Mega Scenery), and, mainly, special interactive features, like the active gates with jetways that automatically recognize aircraft models, Marshalling system, animated ground handling equipments and active hangar doors.
IV - Installation and Documentation
This software installation follows the same steps as others Cloud 9 products, which is fully explained in the Install Guide: download the zip file from the company’s website and start the “.exe” file. Doing so, it will automatically install the complete version of the scenery, available for a 7 minutes evaluation. In order to purchase it, you must restart FS with a default aircraft, reduce to window (Alt+Enter keys), and through the “Add-on Manager” pull-down menu, select “Washington” and follow the onscreen instructions.
This add-on costs $21,99 USD plus VAT, a very reasonable price considering its top quality.
In the zip file, there is also an User Manual (in English and Italian) that, besides describing how the special features work, includes some precious information, such as maps, approach charts, runways specifications, lists of nearby navaids, airports and flight situations, and a few suggestions for framerate improvements.
Therefore, it is remarkable how the developers find significance providing a very complete and useful documentation.
V - Exploring the scenery and its features
Nowadays, Washington National has two passenger terminals and three runways: the main north-south 01/19 (6.869 ft) with overruns in both ends, the southeast-northwest 15/33 (5.204 ft) and the east-west 04/22 (4.911 ft), all of them 150 ft wide.
Present since 1941, the historic Terminal A has been expanded over the following years to its current size, after a final expansion completed in 1955. This terminal has 9 gates, and it is being renovated to restore its original architecture.
However, this airport was transformed in 1997 by the official opening of a modern three-level Terminal (B/C), designed by the renowned Argentina’s architect Cesar Pelli (designer of Malasian Petronas Twin Tower). This new terminal adds 36 gates (10-45) along 3 piers, 100 ticket counters, 12 baggage claims and a passenger connector to Terminal A.
The Terminal B/C, which offers direct connections to the Metrorail public transportation system and public parking garages via two enclosed pedestrian bridges, houses the “National Hall”, a friendly environment for shops and eateries on the concourse level, surrounded by works of art from 30 artists incorporated into the structure using various designs: glass, marble, mosaic, terrazzo, murals, balustrades and sculptures.
Completing this fascinating airport, there are the cargo and general aviation terminals, hangars, handling facility area and the Washington Metropolitan Authority building.
The surrounding perimeter has also been nicely reproduced with several buildings, parking garages, terrain textures with season effects, roads and dynamic objects (cars and trains).
Besides the excellent level of detail, this scenery’s most interesting feature is represented by some interactive resources that create a dynamic environment by reproducing real situations with accuracy.
The User Manual shows the location of active gates and/or automatic ground equipments that recognize several aircraft models, including AI. When ready to pushback, release the parking brakes and the jetway will move to the stand-by position by itself. Once pushback starts, the ground equipment will be removed after a few seconds.
To taxi back to Terminal B/C gates, this scenery offers a Marshalling service for parking operations. An active Marshall will give real and correct parking indications, according to the specific position of different aircraft types. Once parked, the jetway will automatically move towards the aircraft (without any command key or radio tuning). Shortly after, ground equipment will show up.
Another interesting feature is the hangar door system. When an aircraft parks in front of either south hangar 2 or 7, it is recognized by the scenery, which automatically opens this hangar door.
VI - Performance
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Test System: AMD Athlon XP 3000+ Barton, ASUS A7N8X-Deluxe, 1024Mb RAM DDR 400Mhz, ATI Radeon 9600XT (128 Mb), MS Windows XP com SP2, MS Flight Simulator 9.1, Amazing AI (by Renato Pereira) |
Basically, these tests have confirmed the Cloud9's commitment of maintaining the impact on the framerate as low as possible. Indeed, even though a medium-performance test system (with relatively antique components) had been used, this add-on showed a satisfactory performance with both default and third-party aircrafts.
Without any AI traffic, this scenery has a surprisingly fast performance. However, when heavier loads were applied, the framerate dropped considerably. Therefore, this test system required a low AI Traffic setup in order not to compromise playability.
VII - Conclusions
Cloud9's Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport proved to be an excellent consumer’s option for those who appreciate testing their skills on a top quality airport that is highly detailed and full of special features. These properties are truly important to reproduce an interesting simulation environment.
Besides, the fact that the real KDCA is subjected to so many restrictions makes it a great opportunity to simulate challenge procedures, working as a practice for those who demand to stay close to reality.
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FINAL AVALIATION:
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Check this youtube link, and watch a real in-cockpit video of an A319 proceeding the “Visual River Rwy 19” approach, recorded by Steve “bondjmsb”.
Thanks:
My true thanks to all Aerovirtual staff, specially Bruno Gobbato and Elisio, for the opportunity and orientation, as well as to Kal-El Salem, for editing and publishing, and, finally, to Cloud9 team, for granting us to evaluate this excellent add-on.
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