California Screamin' 10 (CSX)

Event Info

Pilot Flightboard

Controller Lineup

Event Archive

Saturday 9/25/04 starting at 1100 PST (1800Z)

The Los Angeles and Oakland ARTCC's are pleased to announce the 10th installment of the very popular California Screamin' Series to be held Saturday, September 25th, 2004. Popularly known as "CalScream," VATUSA's largest online event hopes to smash previous online records by attracting traffic to the extremely realistic environment CalScream creates. From 1700z through into the evening, you can expect to find some of the most realistic and professional controlling available outside of the real aviation community. Aircraft will be travelling across the ZLA and ZOA skies in many directions at once.

As a pilot, you can expect to have multiple traffic advisory calls from many different directions enroute to your destination. Pilots can expect to encounter many methods of air traffic management utilized by Air Traffic Controllers to safely guide planes from one place to another. Such methods include: vectors for traffic, altitude and speed restrictions, holding patterns, sequencing, parallel approaches, land-and-hold-short operations, and ground stops, among others.

We strongly encourage all pilots flying into Southern California to fly in or out of airports such as Ontario, Burbank, Santa Ana or even San Diego, instead of LAX and Las Vegas only. Airport and chart information can be found using the link on the left and a list of available Calscream flights, based on real-world commercial traffic, can be found on the Flight Registration Board.

In addition to reserving flights, the flight board serves as a pilot's resource center providing all flight details, routing information and charts. Last minute traffic is also welcome, however, pilots are encouraged to sign up via the flightboard. This "Flight Registration Board" is provided by 11'th Street Technologies. There are more than enough flights for everyone and pilots are encouraged to create a shuttle route for themselves.

We also strongly encourage all text pilots to operate in voice recieve mode. This means that you should install and configure Advanced Voice Client (AVC), so that you can monitor and recieve ATC voice communications even if you are unable to transmit with voice yourself. Please notify your controller that you are able to recieve voice. This will help make the CalScream experience better for everyone involved. Text only pilots may experience delays due to the high volume of traffic expected.

ZLA controllers are committed to providing the best possible service to our text-only pilots. That commitment extends to asserting that text-only pilots will receive equal priority with voice traffic in all operational conditions. In these high traffic events, text-only pilots can assist ATC by realizing that the majority of ATC dialog will likely be occuring via voice, and that in the mix, some text calls from aircraft may be genuinely missed by controllers. Text-only aircraft are invited to call again via text if their initial radio message appears to have been missed or if an "unreasonable or flight-critical" delay seems to be occurring. However, just like the real world, the instruction "standby" means just that, indicating an acknowledgement, and that further instructions will be forthcoming as soon as possible.

Please do not utilize private chat messages to controllers as this actually makes delays worse. To maximize voice bandwidth at times, voice-enabled pilots should expect to receive some instructions via text, either due to necessity, or to assist clarity in communication.

ZLA aims to provide the best possible environment and outcome for all pilot particpants, be they text-only, receive-only or voice-enabled, and at all levels of expertise and ability. ZLA also seeks to provide a challenging and rewarding experience for all ATC involved. To achieve this requires patience and mutual respect by all participants, as well as careful preparation and attention to detail by everyone involved.

With these guidelines in mind, strap in, and start your pre-flight check because it's going to be a wild ride as we embark on CalScream X!

For questions about the event, please contact events@laartcc.org.