Madeira Islands for FS2002 by PTSIM

By Andrew Herd (18 August 2003)

he Madeira Islands lie three hundred miles off the North African coast and were discovered accidentally by Portugese sailors in 1418 when they were strayed off course during a voyage of exploration. Today they are a popular holiday destination, and though modern airliners rely on inertial navigation systems rather than the astrolabes that fifteenth century sailors used, the journey is still a challenging one. After a 90 minute flight from Lisbon in Portugal, pilots have to contend with testing weather conditions, a runway at Funchal that has no over or undershoot and one of the most non-standard approaches in the world.

Funchal was covered as part of our 'Dangerous Approaches' series a couple of years back and at the time I remarked how surprising it was that no-one had come up with a really good scenery of the islands, not least because the approach is so notorious. The good news is that PTSIM have come up with an addon that includes not only an accurate simulation of Funchal (LPMA) but also Porto Santo (LLPS) and a replacement mesh to replace FS2002's rather half-hearted scenery.

Funchal opened in 1964 with a 1600 meter runway that TAP's Lockheed Super Constellations operated from. When it became clear that modern jets needed rather more pavement than that, the runway was extended to 1800 meters, the work being completed in 1986, but it rapidly became clear that a still longer runway was needed - the problem being where to build it. Although it isn't obvious when you look at the default mesh, Madeira is volcanic and has precipitous sides, with very few flat areas indeed; most of the houses are built on steep slopes and have terrific views as a result.

The solution was to reorientate the runway slightly and to extend it over the sea on stilts. This project was completed in 1995 and Funchal (now renamed Madeira Airport) has 2781 metres of pavement, the ends of which are supported on 180 enormous pillars. A new apron and terminal have also been built. While this eases pilots' minds on short final, the work hasn't solved the problems of arrival and departure and it is still necessary to begin a 40 degree turn almost immediately after takeoff in order to avoid the terrain. Depending on wind direction and cloud base, an arrival on 05 involves flying a circling approach, with a tight turn that blends into short final - a maneuver that is so tricky that a set of lights have been built to help align the aircraft. Even so, only captains who are current on the approach are allowed in - as you can see from the screenshot below, it isn't easy.

Porto Santo is older than Madeira Aiport, dating back to '59, although major work has been done since, the runway having been extended by nearly 50% to its current 3000 meters. Although the approach isn't quite as challenging as Funchal's, the runway lies north-south inbetween two mountains, so it isn't a place for taking your eyes off the meatball.

I reviewed PTSIM's Portugal 2000 a couple of years ago and liked it, so as you can imagine, I was keen to see what the developer could do with Funchal. The package is available as a 31 Mb self-installing download from PTSIM's website at a cost of 25 Euros and there is also a boxed version for 30 Euros plus shipping. Minimum hardware specs are:

• FS2002
• Windows 98/ME/2000/XP
• Pentium 400 MHz or better
• 128 MB RAM memory
• 3D Graphic Card with 32 MB of RAM
• 100 MB hard disk space

Once again, the processor speed quoted is optimistic and given that Madeira Island LOD 10 mesh, photorealistic textures, has detailed airports, and plenty of off-airport scenery, I don't think I would even try loading it on less that a 750 MHz Pentium. The models for the islands were derived from DTED2 data supplied by the Portuguese's Army Geographic Institute and then landclassed using aerial photos - and it looks very nice indeed.

The installation includes two manuals, one of which covers installation issues before going into great detail about the approaches (two situation files are included to enhance the experience). The other manual contains the plates and material from the relevant pages of the Aeronautical Information Publication covering both airports - even if you have no intention of using the scenery for IFR flight, give this a read, because it is scary.

The scenery is well designed, its best features being Madeira Airport and the mesh - as you can see from the screenshots, the package considerably enhances the default scenery. In a default FS2002 installation, the islands beyond the airport are flat and uninteresting, the mountainside is less steep and is set well back from the runway, all of which goes to make it hard to work out why the approach is so challenging in real life. Install the addon and you will immediately realise why it has such a bad reputation, but more to the point, you will also gain an opportunity to enjoy a really first class example of how realistic an FS2002 scenery can look.

A low level flight around the islands is interesting but I doubt you will want to repeat it because there isn't that much to see - which is more or less how it should be. The addon places numerous houses on the hillside near Madeira Airport and though you will see the odd residence hanging partly in space, a good deal of attention has clearly gone into building up a lifelike appearance to the islands. Porto Santo is an exceptionally pleasant piece of design and as you can see from the screenshot above, do an overflight at FL200 and the scenery is about as real as it could get. However, the major attraction of the addon is that it is the best simulation of Funchal available for FS2002 and it deserves to sell well - especially if the developers can upgrade it to work in A Century of Flight, which according to their web site they now have.