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Austrian Airports
By Terblanche Jordaan (24 September 2004)
e did it again!This time even more airports, more details and much more to experience of this wonderful country! Between the borders of Switzerland, Germany, Italy, Slovakia, Czech Republic, Hungary and Slovenia you will find Austria well known for its scenery, music and ski resorts.
Stefan Rausch's second release brings you two sets of Austrian Airports, covering almost every single airport in Austria. They are neatly packaged in DVD boxes and come with high quality booklets with gloss paper that has the history of every airport, with pictures and Jeppesen Charts of every airport in his series.
Austrian Airports Volume 1 has 3 International Airports, 11 Airfields and 3 Heliports for €34.90 while Austrian Airports Volume 2 has also 3 International Airports, 13 Airfields and 1 Heliport also for €34.90.
The web site dedicated to this scenery could be found at www.fsquality.com and all the scenery that Stefan covered have pictures and more info if you need to find out more.
First Impressions
It installs like a dream and before your could say "1 ... 2 ... 3" you will be at an airfield of your choice. If you look at the amount of detail that Stefan introduced in his scenery, you will not believe the little impact it has on your frame rates.One could only wonder how much time went into preparation for this project because he must have traveled through Austria and taken thousands of pictures of every single airfield that he wanted to create for FS2004. Undoubtedly he must be one of the most skilled designers for Microsoft Flight Simulator and if you look at the pictures, it is hard to tell which one is a picture of the 'real' thing and which one is only a screenshot taken in FS2004.
Even more impressive is his incorporation of larger buildings and towers in his scenery and here his designing skills show that no construction is too hard to recreate in MSFS.
Look at this tower from Graz and tell me which one is real and which one is from FS2004?
Right through the scenery, it strikes you time and again to see all the detail. Let these few pictures speak for themselves:
You must agree, this sets the standard of scenery to come because I have not seen this quantity and detail anywhere else. As with my review on his first release of Austrian Airports for FS2002, I've decided to take you on a virtual flight through Austria. I will include the flight plan for FS2004 as well as the flight plan for FS Navigator.
Leg 1
We start at a small airfield in the far west of the country called Dornbirn (LOIH) and for the first leg we will fly to Hoefen (LOIR).
Leg 2
After a cup of coffee we depart for Innsbruck (LOWI) and because the Piper Warrior could not go over the high mountains, we will go through the valley to Innsbruck.
Leg 3
From Innsbruck we again take the valley route to St Johann (LOIJ) with its wonderful hot air balloons, and Stefan provided us with a great vintage photo of St Johann.
Leg 4
From Innsbruck we take the skies to Salzburg (LOWS) with surprising landmarks in and around the city of Mozart. Ask permission from ATC to overfly the airfield and take a trip around the city before landing. All the airport buildings are done with breathtaking detail.
While at Salzburg we could take a chopper to one of the many heliports that Stefan included; this one is south of Salzburg at Werfing Festung.
Leg 5
From Salzburg (LOWS) we fly south to Zell am Zee (LOWZ) and after landing and refueling we see a picture of Stefan in a Cessna leaving LOWZ after one of his many visits to a close by ski resort called Saalbach where his family has a house - convenient for the winter months but equally beautiful in summer.
Leg 6
From Zell am Zee (LOWZ) we take the last shift of the day, in a zigzag down to Klagenfurt (LOWK) and we fly past Nikolsdorf (LOKL) to Mauterndorf (LOSM) and down to Klagenfurt. The late afternoon brings some mist and low clouds and we have to make use of our IFR skills and pull a full ILS landing at Klagenfurt. We are half way through our journey and will stay the night in this wonderful town.
Leg 7
Early next morning and we leave Klagenfurt (LOWK) for Graz (LOWG) and although they are relatively close to one another, we are going to fly past several other airfields to see what they look like. The first one is Wolfsberg (LOKW) and then Zeltweg Airforce Base (LOXZ) to Turnau (LOGL) then Kapfenberg (LOGK) and then Graz (LOWG).
Leg 8
From Graz (LOWG) we fly to Spitzerberg (LOAS) close to Vienna (LOWW) and we past several airfields like Furstenfeld (LOGF) and Punitz-Gussing (LOGG).
Leg 9
From Spitzerberg (LOAS) we fly past Vienna (LOWW) and notice a lot of traffic and the weather is really getting bad. Hope we will get to Langenlois (LOAG).
Leg 10
Early next morning (clear skies!) from Langenlois (LOAG) we fly west to Linz (LOWL).
Leg 11
From Linz (LOWL) we fly towards Suben (LOLS) and then south Niederoblam (LOGO).
Leg 12
And so we enter our final leg from Niederoblam (LOGO) to Vienna (LOWW) via Trieben (LOGI) and Mariazell (LOGM) to Voslau (LOAV) and finally with our little Piper Warrior still flying like a dream between all the heavies into Schwechat (LOWW).What a wonderful trip through Austria with FScene ground textures; Lago's Mesh scenery for Austria and the Australian Simulation Piper Warrior...and a very BIG thanks for Stefan Rausch!
The scenery of these packages is superb and gives you a variety of
places to go in Austria. The main international airports are well
situated to take flights to closer destinations in Germany, Italy and
France.
The detail at the airports and photorealistic textures on buildings deserve an award for the fine artist.
We lift our glasses and says: Well done Stefan...you did it again!
Terblanche Jordaan
Download flight plan in .fsn format
terblanche1@telkomsa.net
Download flight plan in .pln format
View a video over St Johan
