Hey all!
I had a maybe fun idea; thought I'd throw it out for consideration.
So, I've been having fun with the new MFC (when I can sim which hasn't been often lately), and since one of the first tours has us visiting Annette island, I loaded up the PANT fly in scenery which for some reason I'd never tried. Very nice btw! But, since I happened to be experimenting with the Flight Replicas Super Cub Ultra (man, what a better flight model than their original Super Cub), I started noodling around with the STOL contest line on the aux runway...
... which led to wondering how a group of simmers flying together online could hold a STOL contest, how it could be fairly judged etc. I thought about users installing landing distance gauges and self-reporting, but this wouldn't honor distance from a known point (threshold) nor would it disqualify early touchdowns (note that I'm not suggesting anyone would cheat; those things are just difficult to self- determine). I figured we would need a judge / observer for this...
Which led to messing around with measuring and drawing lines across the strip in ADE to create a scenery with a grid of distance markings at the end of the runway. Theoretically, a "judge" could set up a view position right on the threshold line to verify a legal touchdown, then zap to an overhead view and count the lines on the runway up to the main gear once the plane stops, for an accurate landing distance. I've tried to draw the grid with accurate distance measurements so it should roughly match a landing distance gauge if a pilot might be using one.. but the important thing would be that competitors would all be against the same scenery grid.
Takeoff distance would have to be judged similarly, probably using distance marker signs and a side view?
There would definitely be some logistical complexity to planning something like this, and there would probably have to be a minimum level of interest expressed ahead of time to make it worthwhile. It'd be a bummer to put in the time planning and have two people show up (says the guy who possibly wouldn't show up anyway since all my free time to sim is usually later at night lol).
For competitors though, it could be pretty simple. Just install a piece of RTMM scenery (with the runway markings) and show up and fly your best ;-).
There are all sorts of fun options involving different classes of aircraft, group fly - ins to pre-position etc, if folks wanted... but it could be much simpler too.
I've never heard of an online group doing something like this. Thoughts? Would anyone else find that fun?