Palma de Mallorca Scenery
By Aman Kumar (2 June 2001)
ell,
I'm back. Not enough time given to you guys to recuperate from the
last one, but I am back! This time, it's scenery. And what scenery!
It's by none other than Oliver Pabst, and it's none other than Palma
de Malaria! (My spell-check does not like me).
 Hmm...Didn't know I was a large bird flying to Frankfurt! |
 Plenty of static aircraft to make you feel at home! If you're flying Iberia, of course... |
"Why such unheard of an airport?" you ask. Ah, unheard of, maybe, to most non-Spanish, but Oliver's LEPA is revolutionary in its design! I mean, have you ever before downloaded scenery that services your own plane? That generates follow-me trucks for you to follow? That is probably the most accurate depiction of any airport since Microsoft decided to design Kalamazoo Municipal?
Phew. Now you know why. Anyway, to now change to past tense.
Installation
Installation was easy: though there is no executable, the documentation provided is comprehensive and helpful. Also, you must read the manual to find out how to make things such as follow-me cars, catering trucks, etc, work.I decided that the best way to get my first impressions of this scenery was to fly a standard, left-hand pattern (I hope that's normal in Spain!) from and to its runway 24R.
 Now you see it... |
 ...now you don't! |
The Gates
I decided to fly this particular pattern in Project OpenSky's 767-300ER (no, this is not an advertisement!), in an appropriate Iberia livery. I slewed over to the less-than-favorable (for a runway 24R departure) Stand 66, and prepared for the flight.Some eye-candy I noticed here was the safegate docking system. Though it currently supports only a few aircraft, and could be more comprehensive and detailed, it is a welcome addition to any scenery; the departure board visible inside the transparent terminal (here, I was Condor flight DE1654 to Frankfurt!); the specially textured taxiway lines; well-modeled gates, etc. One slight flaw I noticed here: when in spot plane mode, when you move your 'camera' to a certain height, the passenger bridges disappear! Camera shy, perhaps?
Assimilating and admiring, I called for pushback.
 Oops...mayday! Mayday! |
 On short final, skimming the approach lights and...is that a marker? |
Taxiing
Navigation through the simple layout of this airport was a breeze, assisted by well drawn taxiway lines, numerous, helpful taxiway signs, and, of course, the inimitable top-down view!It was no boring ride, either. Several appropriately positioned and liveried static planes enlivened the scenery.
After the expected delay of about 3-4 minutes, there began a volley of wind-dependent, traffic-sensitive dynamic aircraft. If there is a plane approaching the runway, the dynamic scenery will not merrily take off off the same! There were ground vehicles that actually serviced the dynamic scenery and many dynamic planes.
One major flaw I noticed during my trip to the active, however, was that there are certain, invisible patches of 'cobblestones', where the plane's speed dips sharply down to nil, requiring considerable thrust to get her rolling again. Oliver has told me that this is due to the unique deviations he has made from the standard SDK code, and is experienced only in a few, small areas, all of which I seemed to have met!
 Wow! I'm being serviced! |
 Another view of the same... |
Approach
After taking off and flying the circuit, I swung back to intercept the 24R localizer. On final, I overflew the nice looking approach lights and markers, to touch down smoothly (yeah, right!) on the skid marks just beyond the numbers.
The Rest
I then taxied to a predefined position where a little follow-me truck blinked knowingly and came over just in front of me. When I started rolling, the truck led me, rather fast, through a few twisting turns before finally bringing me to - appropriately enough! - Iberia Stand 17!I then fiddled around with the frequencies exactly as told, and lo and behold the gates moved over and the fully animated catering truck drove over from its depot, lifted its loader and began servicing my aircraft! This truck was fully animated, with a smooth motion as the 'scissors' hoisted up the loader! There were flashing lights, moving stands, everything!
There were, in other areas, buses shuttling passengers to and fro (these buses actually stop beside the passenger stairs of some static aircraft), a detailed control tower, oil slick effects, and much more.
Having dislocated my jaw gaping, I made a quick trip to the ICU, came back after 2 weeks fit and fine, then cleared the cobwebs off the monitor and slewed up, high above LEPA, and switched the sun off.
Wow! This airport was even better, if possible, at night! Floodlit aprons, a searchlight stabbing the darkness around it, winking ground vehicles scurrying about below...YOWZA!
 LEPA during the day...Bit warped due to low zoom. Note the oil slick effects! |
 And...LEPA at night! Note, well, everything! |
I got so excited that I deactivated slew, applied full power, in midair, recovered from a hair-raising dive just in time, and then kept on flying in circles around the terminal buildings, gasping and yelling out in sheer joy. ("Eez eet a bird? A boomerang? No! Eet's a crazy Pabst fan going around een circles after a jaw deeslocation!" were the exact words heard over the COM1 freq, I believe).
Flaws
Almost flawless. But there is that almost. What needs to be changed:
