- Thu Oct 24, 2019 9:03 am #538550 Hola buen dia. Primero que nada me presento. Mi nombre es José Alfonso Chávez, soy Salvadoreño, miebro de VATSIM desde el año 2008 y miebro del grupo de VATCA en Facebook y en la vida real soy piloto privado con rating IFR y próximo a realizar mi chequeo para piloto comercial.

El motivo del post es para ofrecer un poco de ayuda para reactivar un poco más la región de Centroamérica y hacer que más gente pueda simular aqui. Mi aporte seria con cartas Jeppesen para Centroamerica. Tengo la posibilidad de generar cartas en PDF para cualquier aeropuerto del ciclo actual (en este caso seria el ciclo 1921). Noté que en la página de VATCA no hay cartas de navegación para ningun aeropuerto/pais y he visto que en otras divisiones tienen cartas para hacer los vuelos más reales. Creo que si las cartas para los aeropuertos principales están disponibles, eso atraeria a más gente a volar a Centroamérica.

Si los directores me lo permiten, quisiera contribuir con cartas pero no se si hacerlo:
1- Por medio de un link público de Google Drive.
2- Hacer una página web sencilla en Google Sites para que pueda ir posteando las cartas más recientes.
3- Proveerselas a ustedes como directores y managers para que puedan distriburlas ya sea por medio del grupo de Facebook, en la página principal de VATCA o como crean conveniente.

Ese seria mi granito de arena. Espero poder ser de utilidad para poder hacer crecer la región y también hacer de este nuestro hobby una experiencia más real y dinámica.

Gracias por su tiempo. Espero pasen un buen dia!

José Chávez
PPL/IFR (Real life) // VATSIM Online pilot rated (P1) // VATCA Region

- Thu Oct 24, 2019 9:52 am #538554 Hi Jose,

that's a very kind offer, but Jeppesen charts are copyrighted, even for recreational/simulated use. Here in Germany we were lucky to strike a deal with Jeppesen to publish slightly outdated and well-marked ("For simulation only!") Jeppesen VFR charts as long as they were in a protected place (download restricted for registered and logged-in members). But this was only possible due to personal contacts.

Maybe you have some contacts in your place to strike such a deal, too?

Cheers, Andreas
Member of VATSIM Germany
Follow me at my real world flying job

- Thu Oct 24, 2019 7:36 pm #538608

Hi Jose,

that's a very kind offer, but Jeppesen charts are copyrighted, even for recreational/simulated use. Here in Germany we were lucky to strike a deal with Jeppesen to publish slightly outdated and well-marked ("For simulation only!") Jeppesen VFR charts as long as they were in a protected place (download restricted for registered and logged-in members). But this was only possible due to personal contacts.

Maybe you have some contacts in your place to strike such a deal, too?

Hey Andreas, thanks for the tip. I will see then what I can do to help. Cheers!

Have a nice day!

- Thu Oct 24, 2019 8:38 pm #538613 If one is without access to Jeppesen charts my first choice would be to check to see, if the charts were available via the country's eAIP.
As a example I can see that charts for Honduras can be found online (http://www.ahac.gob.hn/AIPMH_AMDT_0619/inicio.html).
A list of countries AIP can be found at Eurocontrol - https://www.eurocontrol.int/articles/ais-online
For Central America one can have a look at https://cocesna.org/home/aim/

regards
Torben

Torben Andersen, VACC-SCA Controller (C1)

- Fri Oct 25, 2019 12:28 am #538629

For Central America one can have a look at https://cocesna.org/home/aim/

Hi Torben, Cocesna is the regulatory entity in CA that collects all aeronautical data for us. Their AIP website is kind of complicated for newcomers so I have sum up the steps to follow to get the charts.

If anybody reading this needs any chart for any mayor central american airport please follow this steps:

Step 1: Go to https://cocesna.org/home/aim/
Step 2: On the blue bar click on "AIP Centroamerica"
Step 3: Follow the steps below for the country you need charts from.

*** FOR BELIZE, EL SALVADOR, HONDURAS AND NICARAGUA ***
1- Click on "eAIP AMDT". A new browser tab will open.
2- Click on the latest effective date to access the AIP. (Currently is June 20, 2019)
3- Find on the left column the section "AD AERÓDROMOS (AD)".
4- Click the "+" sign under "AD 2 AERÓDROMOS" to reveal the list of airports.
5- Click the "+" sign right next to any airport and click on "AD 2.24 MXXX cartas relativas al aeropuerto" and charts will be available on right side of the page.
(As a shortcut, on step 4 after you reveal the airports click the one you're interested in and when the right side populate just scroll all the way down and the charts will be there for you.)

*** FOR GUATEMALA AND COSTA RICA ***
1- Click on "Conventional AIP"
2- Hover your mouse to "AD / AD 2 Aeródromos" to choose the country and the airport.
3- A new web page will open will the airport information and charts.

I hope this helps..

- Fri Oct 25, 2019 8:08 am #538649 Thanks a lot for this guide to your AIP! Those who do not own a chart subscription with Navigraph or similar can use the official AIP. Everyone should be able to access charts now. Controllers in Central America should refer pilots to this tutorial here so they can access charts, best upload it to your website in English and Spanish, if not done already.

Cheers, Andreas
Member of VATSIM Germany
Follow me at my real world flying job

- Fri Oct 25, 2019 9:12 am #538651 You're welcome! I'm glad I was able to help. I hope the VATCA team sees this and push this procedures to all of us users to fly in this beautiful part of the world.

Most people only fly to Tegucigalpa, Honduras because of the challenge of it, but there are a lot of beautiful approaches that, if you do on a GA aircraft will challenge you. Here are some of them:
- MSSS: Ilopango Int'l airport (My home airport. No ILS, only VOR DME approaches )
- MRLB: Liberia (Cotal north arrival to finish on an ILS approach.)
- MGPB: Puerto Barrios in Guatemala (VFR airport. Take off from MGGT, go south on a VFR flight. Beautiful scenery and good way to practice your VFR route planning and dead reckon as well.)
- MGMM: Mundo Maya, Guatemala (North of Guatemala city. Perfect airport to do an IFR route in a GA aircraft to practice approaches).
- MROC: San José, Costa Rica. PARZA3 arrival. If you have a good global mesh this looks awesome.

Here is an old video I made on 2017 with a B1900D doing the PARZA3 arrival while on VATSIM. I personally use this video to show my flight school pilot friends about VATSIM and how you can improve your IFR skills by using this platform. There was an approach controller available at MROC and generally when my friends see this, they are hooked with the platform.. Hope you like it https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jKOhB2yKJ6w (Sorry for the landing. It seem that I installed the airport scenery but hadn't tweaked the ORBX vector altitude correction tool to fix it. Also, I am not a YouTuber nor stream on twitch, so please don't ask me to show my face. I'm ugly! ajajjajajajja)

Now, as a native spanish speaker I think its on me to do the translation of my own instructions... jejejeje .. Spanish instructions displayed below:

Si alguien leyendo este post necesita cartas de procedimientos de cualquier aeropuerto en Centro América por favor sigan estos pasos:

Paso 1: Acceder a https://cocesna.org/home/aim/
Paso 2: Seleccionar "AIP Centroamerica" en la barra azul de opciones.
Paso 3: Seguir los pasos abajo mencionados para el pais que necesites ver cartas.

*** PARA BELIZE, EL SALVADOR, HONDURAS Y NICARAGUA ***
1- Hacer click en "eAIP AMDT". Una nueva ventana/pestaña de tu navegador se abrirá.
2- Hacer click en el link bajo la fecha en "Currently effective issue". (La última fecha efectiva es 20 de Junio de 2019)
3- En la nueva página buscar "AD AERÓDROMOS (AD)" en la columna de la izquierda.
4- Hacer click en el signo "+" bajo "AD 2 AERÓDROMOS" para desplegar el listado de aeropuertos.
5- Hacer click en el signo "+" a la par del aeropuerto de tu interés y haz click en la opción "AD 2.24 MXXX cartas relativas al aeropuerto". Luego de eso el listado de procedimientos del aeropuerto seleccionado será desplegado en el lado derecho de la página.
6- Como un atajo, en el paso 4, al revelar el listado de aeropuertos puedes hacer click en cualquiera de ellos y la parte derecha de la pantalla tendrá toda la información del aeropuerto. En ese mismo listado las cartas estarán desplegadas si te desplazas hasta el fondo de la pantalla.

*** PARA GUATEMALA Y COSTA RICA ***
1- Hacer click en "Conventional AIP"
2- Posiciona tu mouse sobre el menu "AD / AD 2 Aeródromos" para desplegar el listado de paises. Elige el pais y haz click en el aeropuerto de tu elección.
3- Una nueva ventana se abrirá. Contiene información del aeropuerto y el listado de procedimientos del aeropuerto individuales en PDF.

As I said before, I'm glad I'm able to share and help a little bit. Hope this information is useful and make people want to fly here. Having now charts and other airport data might start to bring more traffic to our area and, hey, a couple of events and fly-in¡s doesn't sound so bad to attract users..

In any case you need help or have any other question please let me know.

Cheers and happy flying!

- Fri Oct 25, 2019 10:33 am #538652 Wow, you are really motivated, nice to see this!! Best you contact the staff of VATCA directly to make them aware of this thread.

Cheers, Andreas
Member of VATSIM Germany
Follow me at my real world flying job

- Tue Nov 05, 2019 10:14 pm #539506 Excelente Aporte Companero!

Jose Gonzalez
VATCA 2

- Wed Nov 06, 2019 3:07 pm #539551

Excelente Aporte Companero!

Jose Gonzalez
VATCA 2

Muchas gracias José!

José Chávez
PPL/IFR (Real life) // VATSIM Online pilot rated (P1) // VATCA Region