Flying Ferret

The previous week I had a chat with Fatih Incognito and a few others in the Shergood Aviation group. While a lot of people may think Second Life is pretty large, you actually run into the world's edges pretty quickly. So there is no way to fly very far without turning back. And If you want to go beyond 600 regions or so you may be turning a lot really.   I mentioned I had not found a log of anyone flying a credible 1000+ regions in one flight. I mean: I had done 1108 once when circling a corner in my DG-1000 Glider but that doesn't feel genuine. So today, with Canary-colleague Jessica waiting for new computer parts and no other Canary online, I decided to have a go at it. The previous week Fatih Incognito had gotten to 674 region crossings and I to 552, my third longest distance ever. This Saturday 25 November I set out at 9AM my local time, with the Adventure Air DHC-6 Twin Otter and a GTFO!-HUD attached to go smuggling. It took me almost 6 hours, of mainly flying the 50 regio...

Yesterday I flew my regular Canary scan, to check my 3 sectors in Eastern Nautilus and South Corsica for grid conditions, when I ran into something new: flying into Bijouter Isle, usually the far eastern edge of one part of my route I noticed there were 2 more regions attached. So I steered my S61R Pelican into them to have a look. I quickly realised that this wasn't just a two-island expansion to Tuarua Fiji, but a completely new world. When I went into hover above a small island with palmtrees, someone IM'ed me, welcoming me and asking if I was interested in renting part of a region. This is how I discovered Azure Islands. Or rather, how I found out that it was moved to a new spot on the grid, connecting to Tuarua Fiji and thereby also to mainland Second Life. Since I visit the surroundings near-daily (restart days excluded) not many may have discovered it yet. So, I sent a notice in SL Aviation. I am pretty sure more people will like to see the expansion to their flying opti...

  Yesterday my Canary 2, the Sikorsky S61R Pelican I fly weather reconnaisance with for the Canary Project, passed the 1000 Hobbs hour mark. What is Hobbs? Well, Wikipedia will explain, but in plain English it it the time the helicopter's engine has been running. It's a log normally used for maintenance reasons. While in real life 1000 hours isn't so much, there being airliners with 10.000 Hobbs and more around the world, in SL it means it has done some serious flying. So I am sort of proud of having this extra digit added to my meter. Especially if you consider this helicotper has also been making 160.000 region crossings in Second Life. As reference: the grid has 27000+ regions and the combined mainlands are some 9000 regions large. The combined area I can fly in from my home base is 6800 regions.* Of course, 1000 Hobbs hours also means it is time for some maintenance now. Certainly if you follow this historic moment up by a landing like this...   * Source: http://www.gri...

  Given that there is no central authority in Second Life that issues Pilot's Licences and that Shergood Aviation has such a project going on, but it is far from ready yet, I decided to obtain mine through a friend who is sort of an authority. Or at least, so she claims. The Queen of ɮɝɕɏȸʥʞɝ was kind enough to provide me with the first ever pilot's licenses issued by her Kingdom, which is situated somewhere on Jeogeot's coast. It's rather small, so it may take you a while to find it... I don't think she likes aircraft much since the licence reads that I am qualified to 'pilot all sorts of things', with the following limitation: 'provided they are kept away from us.' I suppose that means I am allowed to fly anywhere, except for in the Kingdom of ɮɝɕɏȸʥʞɝ There it is! I keep my license safely stored in my hangar, on the Ground Power Unit, next to the pizza boxes.  

I've been flying in SL since 2010, so it might be about time I make a blog. Especially since many of my previous publications on forums etc. have vanished with the years, due to Second Life's Aviation forum stopping for instance. So.. this is a good occasion for me, since today I took out my Shergood Aviation Brantly B2B helicopter for it's longest flight to date: Jeogeot Gulf Airport in Spurness , with a stopover in White Star Airport and then on to my other homebase: Aerodrome Amelia Earhart in Xobite . Arrived at Aerodrome Amelia Earhart That spans 5 of Second Life's mainland continents: Jeogeot, Bellisseria (this is most of the flight distance), Satori (once also called maebaleia), Nautilus and Corsica. About to take off from Spurness The idea came to mind after I tested the B2B's fuel consumption and contemplated it might just make the 300 regions between Spurness and White Star. While nearing the destination, I realised I had 1/4 of the tank left, the grid w...