Hurricane Matthew (ASN real time)

[andy1252]

I started up ASN as usual, and of course the "active hurricanes" box actually had something in it - Hurricane Matthew. Now I guess you wouldn't (or probably even couldn't) consider deliberately flying off into something like this for real, but I thought I'd take a look from the safety of my desk. Set the sim to system time, ASN live weather, and set off initially from somewhere in SC (can't now remember where) just to get airborne, then used slew to get on the seaward side of where Google Earth was reporting the storm currently - around Myrtle Beach at the time of doing this.

 

Even sitting at my desk, this was scary. Got completely blacked out at various times, and did use slew mode to try and find the edges of the storm. Eventually ended up flying south from up in Chesapeake Bay and putting down (just) at Langley. I'm so glad we don't get that kind of weather round my way. My sympathies to all the poor souls caught up in it, from the Caribbean up to wherever it eventually wears itself out.

 

And for the forum mods - you may have to take my word that there is Orbx scenery down there! ('cos you can't actually see much of it)

 

 

 

This is supposedly daylight, and that's sunset straight ahead

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Just managed to stop before I joined the freeway.

 

Think I'll stick to sunny skies for a bit.

[Voyager]

Really isn't a good thing to do in real world.

Great shots for sure.

 

Voyager

[VH-KDK]

Interesting shots Andy. Feel so sorry for the folks there especially in Haiti where the loss of life has been horrendous.

11 minutes ago, Voyager said:

Really isn't a good thing to do in real world.

Great shots for sure.

 

Voyager

Dead right Voyager, but some do it for a living!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NOAA_Hurricane_Hunters

Saw a doco about them a few months ago, fascinating viewing.

[RJ]

Scary stuff. Great shots! 

[Jack Sawyer]

That was awesome, hair raising to be sure but ASN did a great job of depicting it.

[Bermuda425]

Well done on this real-world reference! And the plane is definetely the appropriate one...

[andy1252]

Thanks folks. This was a fascinating exercise - I found myself getting really involved in this "flight" knowing it was real-time based. I can't, and don't want to, imagine what it must be like to find yourself up against conditions like this, on the ground or heaven forbid in the air. I had seen a bit on the news about a plane full of techies tracking the storm and that was one of the things that triggered this, and I started by trying to get up over the eye of the storm, but couldn't actually find it, so given that I have my realism settings set way down low (and so ought to be able to move around ok without being shaken to pieces) I thought I'd go down nearer ground level and see what it all looked like from there. Very, very scary.

 

And one confusing thing that took me a while to figure out was ASN updating the weather every 15 mins. I'd be over a bit of coastline, with the ground just about visible below, and then suddenly I'm completely blacked out, in the middle of no visibility cloud. I thought the PC had done something weird the first couple of times it happened!

 

Like I said, it makes me very grateful to live somewhere that is (so far) earthquake, hurricane, tornado, tsunami, sandstorm, plague, war and insurrection free.