Red Bull Air Race 2010 World Championship is back
Once again, this year the Red Bull Air Race opens in Abu Dhabi on 26 & 27 March. The world’s top 15 pilots will start their six-month long battle for championship points in the first of eight races on a total of five continents.
The World Championship will take place in some of the cities already visited by previous Red Bull Air Race Championships, and these are:
- Abu Dhabi (UAE) 26&27 March
- Perth (Australia) 17&18 April
- Rio de Janeiro (Brazil) 8&9 May
- Windsor (Canada) 5&6 June
- New York (USA) 19&20 June
- Lausitz (Germany) 7&8 August
- Budapest (Hungary) 19&20 August
- Lisbon (Portugal) 4&5 September
Want more information? Just browse www.redbullairrace.com and you’ll get pics, videos, news and much more. Just keep tuned with CrossingTheSkies, because there’s more to come!
Red Bull Air Race. Font: www.redbullairrace.com
Merry X-mas!
From CrossingTheSkies staff, we wish you a nice and merry christmas, and a happy new year also! We hope you found this blog beautiful, and we thank you all for visiting it!
We expect a new year (2009) with plenty of new and fresh material, new posts, aviation news, aeronautics and some more.
See you around!
Andrew && Angel
Author: La Roche Spotters
Cross-polar routes
Since 2001, when Russia opened their airspace borders, some airlines thought that flying across the north pole would be much faster, like a shortcut. As a matter of fact, they got right. You can almost save up to 4 hours of flight, flying through the north pole instead of the regular routes.
These regular routes are the PACOTS (Pacific Organized Track System) going from the U.S. west coast to Japan and Honolulu. These are a set of predefined routes (it works like NAT routes), that start within US airspace (a fix) and they finish within Japan airspace (another fix). Between them, there’s just some waypoints defined with coordinates (there are no navaids to define them). So, an airplane departing from JFK had to go to the west coast and then, get en-route in these tracks.
United Airlines, Continental and other Japanese airlines started operating routes through the north pole. Then, they would save time, fuel and consequently money. But it’s not that easy. We all know that in the north pole it’s kinda cold, so it’s pretty likely that kerosene solidify. Nevertheless you can also descend to a lower altitude and modify your original route.
In addition, because of the earth’s magnetic field shape, the cosmic rays are much intense in that area. Therefore, the radiation exposure seems to be greater than the normal quantity. Some expert says that the total radiation exposure up there could be equal to 3 X-ray taken. Here you can appreciate a cross-polar route from JFK to Beijing (Japan) at Great Circle Mapper.
ATC services are not available, since we have no radar coverage. To sum up, it’s really an amazing adventure flying this kind of routes. Pilots must have good skills, and a big coat!
Fly-by-wire and Airbus Laws
Nowadays, commercial airplanes do not fly with metal wires moving the ailerons anymore. Now it is managed digitally, from the source (the sidestick or yoke movements) to the control surfaces movement. This system is called Fly-by-wire.
The fly-by-wire system consists of some computers (5 computers on board the Airbus’ planes, 3 primary and 2 secondary), that read the pilot movements, interpret them, and it sends a modified signal (from the original one) to the control surfaces.
All these means that the airplane movements will not match proportionally what the pilot is doing actually. This philosophy shocked a lot of pilots, they couldn’t imagine flying something without a cable between the yoke and the surfaces. Finally, it was demonstrated that this system was much efficient, safer and much versatile.
Airbus was the first one using fully fly-by-wire (A320 were the first) and they create a set of laws that would govern this system. There are 4 laws: normal law, alternate law, direct law and mechanical back-up depending on the degradation of the airplane.
- Normal Law: It is on when normal operation is carried out. It controls the 3 axis (pitch, roll and yaw) balancing the aircraft and interpreting the sidestick movements. In addition, it offers some envelope flight protections (on pitch attitude and roll attitude) and alleviate load factors, like the gravity when turning for a much better comfort.
- Alternate Law: If a minor failure exists (sensors disagreement, computer blackout, hydraulic system upset,etc) this law becomes the active one. Basically it provides the same control as the normal law, but without protections. Also, the roll control becomes “direct law-like” control.
- Direct Law: If a major failure exists (radio altimeter failure when approaching, 3 inertial references down, etc) this law become the active one. Then, the movements of the control surfaces are the same as the sidestick movements. There is no auto trim, and any protection system will be available (even alpha-floor for stall warning).
- Mechanical Back-up: This mechanical aid should be used when the electrical system is all down. Then, the airplane can only be controlled with the trim wheel for pitching, and rudder pedals for rolling.
The SELCAL Code
The SELCAL system or Selective Calling system, commonly used in aeronautical communications, is a multiple system that allows the radio ground-based operator to send a signal to the aircraft that wants to establish a communication. In other words, when an ATC want to talk with an airplane flying over the ocean, he pushes a button and the airplane’s crew receive a message. That is kind of worthy in oceanic routes, where HF (High Frequency) communications give a lot of background noise, and pilots usually turn off the squelch until they receive this signal.
In order to identify each single aircraft, a SELCAL code is assigned to each one. This code is made by 2 pairs of letters (using from “A” to “S” excluding “I” and “O”) and each letter has an assigned frequency. Then, when the operator wants to talk with that aircraft, a 4-tone signal is sent with those letters. Everybody who is in that frequency will hear that sound, but only the one with that code will receive a sound alert (bling-blong-like sound) and a light alert.
There are 10920 different SELCAL codes. That’s the reason why there are duplicate codes (two airplanes, same code). Only airplanes operating oceanic routes use that system though. So, when a duplicate code exists, they make certain that those airplanes will operate in widely separate parts of the world.
ARINC (Aeronautical Radio Inc.) issues these codes in the US. You can find real-world SELCAL codes in this website just entering the registration number.
5 commentsVirgin America will launch an in-flight WiFi
Virgin America will release an in-flight wireless Internet on all his flights by the second quarter of 2009. In fact, they flew a test flight from San Francisco to test the whole system and it kinda works.
This gadget, called GoGo, will not forbid any special content, but there will be some constraints though ( no Skype, no IP voice systems,…). The company’s philosophy is not to edit the content that passengers want to watch, but to offer WiFi in order to let the people choose what to watch. This system will be available above 1000 feet and it works with 3G technology.
Thence, get connected in the airplane will be $10 on short flights, and $13 on longer legs. You just need a laptop to get access. Virgin says that later in 2009 they will include an integrated in-flight entertainment system, that will give connectivity to people who don’t have laptops or PDA’s.
Of course, nowadays, a lot of airlines are willing to incorporate this devices to their birds.
