Dream984.zip - Version 5
FS98 Scenery for Groom Lake and Area 51 ("Dreamland")
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This scenery includes the famous Area 51 "secret" base, which the government denied its existence for some time. The base is site for testing of classified/secret U.S. aircraft, and also has attracted a cult of UFO enthusiasts which believe the U.S. recovered a UFO at Roswell in the '40's and is being reverse engineered at this site. Besides, this package includes detailed scenery of the Nellis Air Force Range and Nuclear Testing site, the largest government owned piece of real estate, roughly the size of Connecticut. This area is of great historical importance in both aircraft and weapons development. It is real and currently very active. Weather UFO's exist there or not, that's another story. Rumors published on Popular Mechanics about this area being phased out have largely been discredited.
INSTALLATION:
Create a directory tree structure like this:
C:\..\area51\scenery.
Place all the .bgl , .dki, .dk$ files in this scenery directory: (C:\..\area51\scenery\); then, move the texture files (*.R8, *.*af) to your main texture directory in FS98, or to c:\..\area51\texture.
If you unzip with winzip, and it unzips with directory structure, simply drag the area 51 directory to your FS98 directory and ignore the steps before.
Activate the scenery using the scenery library option in the FS98 "world" menu. Scenery must be set on "local" and scenery area "active" in the scenery library menu. Please refer to the afd.txt file for facility directory information. ILS/ATIS frequencies are fictional, of course. The airports will be accessible from the "Scenery from 6.0 and before" option. You should not turn off your CD-ROM performance boosters when using this scenery.
REQUIREMENTS: this scenery, as many others in the net, requires you have installed airport v2.*/VOD textures. These are available at www.SurClaro. They are used by a few macros in the scenery.
AIRPORTS:
Area 51: most famous base in the area, site of the world's largest runway! (estimated to be about 27,000 feet long, about 8.5 km!). Test site for aircraft such as the SR-71 and the Aurora secret hypersonic spy plane (mach 8 capable). Includes research site. Highly detailed.
Papoose lake: this is were UFOlogists claim the government has a secret underground base were UFO/alien research takes place. I placed a helipad there for you to check it out. It may not exist in real life. But who knows? Why not put something there?
Groom Ranch: Civilian type installation owned by the military, within the borders of the base.
Mesa helipad: This is mostly a military recreation area, within the borders of the base. Maybe also used by security helicopters.
Base camp: Located north of Area 51, near U.S. 6 road. It is closed, but serves a role as an emergency runway for aborted takeoffs from Groom lake. NEW IN VERSION 4: This airport is now open, and realistic details have been added according to some new information and pictures received.
Yucca: Located near the nuclear testing zone. Landing there requires approval from the U.S. Department of Energy. If you approach from the west, you may notice some bleedthrough from the Las Vegas scenery. There is nothing I can do to fix that at this time. Fixing it means altering the altitude so that if you fly north from Las Vegas the scenery comes up and hits you in the face. NOTE: even though, there is a lot of difference in altitude in FS98 between Las Vegas and north. Allow sufficient altitude when flying north, as in FS98 all tiles look the same altitude from your point of view, then rise when you fly into a higher one. Therefore, you may experience scenery "rising" when flying north from Las Vegas with or without my scenery.
Tonopah test range: located on the north end of the complex, 35 miles SW of Tonopah, NV. Includes navaid and ATIS frequencies which are supposed to be real. Sandia labs are located in that site. Birthplace and principal testing site for the legendary F-117 stealth bomber.
Area 19: otherwise known as the "cheshire" airfield. There is still debate on weather this secret airfield exists or not, but there are very strong arguments in favor of the former. This airfield is supposed to be "satellite proof" It is hidden under the desert sand; upon clearance, making sure no satellite is tracking the base, a sprinkler system activates to clean up the camouflaged runway so that aircraft can land. Therefore, the pilot has to make a blind approach until the runway becomes visible on the last few kilometers. Facilities are underground. Unfortunately, I could not recreate this effect in FS98, so I rendered it as a sand runway.
Desert Rock airfield (DRA). Located near Mercury, Nevada, in the south end of the range. Public airport, but used by the Department of Energy and Janet aircraft (Janet is the airline that ferries workers to/from Groom Lake). Apparently, Janet aircraft sometimes land here under an instruction codename "watchdog", presumably because there are civilian onlookers at the mountains near Area 51.
VERSION HISTORY:
NEW IN VERSION 3:
There is a VORTAC now at Groom Lake (117.5). I found it recently on the web. Many people have reported this signal, which can be picked at different points around the base and its source therefore can be mathematically calculated. Also, in the last version I forgot to document the TTR TACAN VOR (113.3), and Base Camp VORTAC (AEC; 113.9). See AFD.txt
I redid the mountains south of Groom Lake for more realism. Now approaching Groom lake from the south is more difficult. Note Pyramid hill, a visual waypoint used by Janet pilots flying into Groom Lake. It is a pyramid shaped hill which stands out from the scenery and is lighter in color. Turning to heading 321 degrees over Pyramid hill should line you up with the runway while clearing the mountains ahead safely over a narrow valley.
I did other minor changes, including static Janet CT-43's at Groom Lake and TTR. Some of the statics as well as some buildings and mountains can be turned on/off by adjusting scenery density.
NEW IN VERSION 4:
Added dynamic scenery, using FS Action! and Dynkit. This includes Auroras, F-117's, an SR-71, 737's, tanks and jeeps. They are located at the Area 51 and TTR airports, and in a target site south of TTR. Note that the static aircraft added on version 3 now need dynamic scenery to be on in order to be seen.
New dry lake texture, custom made.
Added target sites; one on the northeast corner of Groom lake is an abandoned 1950's airfield used now for target practice. Another is south of TTR. There are several craters in these sites, if you can visualize them.
Redid the mountains a bit to improve visual quality and accuracy. I also include an alternate scenery file (nv_3.alt) which gives an alternate texture to the mountains for those that don't like the desert texture. To use, rename your nv_3.bgl and nv_3.bgl to nv_2.bak and nv_3.bak, and rename nv_3.alt and nv_3.alt to nv_2.bgl and nv_3.bgl, thus replacing each .bgl file. Reverse the process to restore the desert textures.
IMPORTANT!->do not use both at the same time.
Added Harrigan Mesa communications facility near Base Camp, with a helipad; Also added a helipad in Site 4, near TTR; a radar facility used in training. and also added a menu entry for the little town of Rachel, NV. There's no runway there but small private aircraft have been known to land in the nearby desert. See the Little A'Le'Inn, which is an excellent place for UFO tertulia and the innovative gasless chili.
Base Camp is now open (see above)
Increased size of scenery "tiles". This has no visual effect, but minimizes wind layer changes that cause "rollercoasting".
Included a Final Approach plate (GROOM LAKE - RUNWAY 32.IAP). Final Approach shareware program is required to view this file.
Groom lake ATIS is now 127.1 (see afd.txt)
Finally, updated and added minor miscellaneous scenery, according to some new information.
NEW IN VERSION 5:
New mountain textures (courtesy of Noel Sivertson).
Updated Groom Lake area based on new high resolution photos. For example, there is a water tower almost identical to the new water tower in the scenery; the location of the control tower was changes, and added a few things that were evident in the high res pictures but not in the sattelite photographs nor research maps.
Also changed the dry lakes to a default color other than blue; this caused the dry lakebeds to appear blue when the "textured water" option was turned off.
Added the "Korean Airfield", a mock-airfield used for target practice.
Added the Pahute mesa airfield (VFR day only), code name "yuletide".
Added the Tolicha peak facility (TPECR), which is used to train fighter pilots against radar targets and threats.
Added the actual Pahute mesa and Tolicha peak mountains, plus updated other mountains, including Bald mountain and Tikaboo peak.
Added the Kawich lake north of Pahute mesa, with its strange "bullseye" structure.
I have created this scenery based on extensive web information as well as satellite photographs, ground-based photographs, USGS maps, and aeronautical charts to create a very accurate representation (as much as possible) of the base, and adjacent bases. My goal was to create the most accurate scenery version possible of this area. I hope you enjoy it.
If you wish, you can visit the following websites for more information:
http://www.in-search-of.com/frames/area51/area51_nf.shtml
http://www.nauticom.net/users/ata/area51.html
http://www.ufomind.com/area51/
or my website, http://pages/prodigy.net/dpinero, which includes these and more links, plus pictures, screenshots, information and the latest updates on my work.
I have not included any pictures from Area 51 as I did before in this package, since they now will be available at my webpage, therefore reducing download size/time of the zip file.
TROUBLESHOOTING:
Question: The Groom lake runway is not visible until a couple of miles away.
Answer: There's nothing that can be done to correct this at this time. According to expert designer Justin Tyme, runways are hard-coded into the program to turn from lines to a full runway at about 5-7 NM from the center of the runway, or so. A 27,000-foot runway is
over five miles long in itself, so the 2-3 miles is about right. (Thanks Justin)
Question: The dynamic scenery disappeared after I slew around or changed airports.
Answer: This has happened to me also on rare occasions. I don't know what causes it but it seems unrelated to dynamic scenery complexity. Resetting dynamic scenery by turning it off and on will bring it back.
Question: Why is my frame rate is slower than the previous version?
Answer: This scenery has grown in complexity, but the main reason for frame rate slow down is dynamic scenery. If it's too slow, you can try adjusting the dynamic scenery to lower density, or turning it off. Static aircraft are also dynamic objects, even though they are static, and slow down things a bit more because they have shadows. Nevertheless, I get a normal frame rate on my P166 MMX, 24 RAM, no 3d.
CREDITS/THANKS: This scenery was created using Abacus Airport and Scenery designer, and Airport v. 2.05f. Static aircraft were created by Trevor de Stigter's m98tobgl utility. Static aircraft are by Mike Hill (Aurora), Rod Conklin (SR-71), and Chris Evans (F-117). Tanks and Hummer by Jerry Arzdorf. Dynamic scenery using FS Action!(Abacus) and Dynkit (Konstantin Kukushin). Custom macros were created using Prefab (VS). Many thanks to these authors. I'd like to thank T. & D. Gregor, Sr., for his review at the Scenery hall of fame for the previous version, and Justin Tyme for his advice. Also thanks to Tim Dickens and Rafael Sanchez for the macros. Thanks also to the websites listed above, to Norio (Groomwatch), Area 51 Research Center, Tom Mahood, and the Interceptors for a lot of information they indirectly made available to me, and to USGS and those anonymous people at USENET.
DISCLAIMER: I am not responsible of any damages caused by misuse of this files. I am not responsible for any alien abductions that may result from use of these files either :-). Use at your own risk.
This file is FREEWARE. Absolutely no money may be charged for it. It may be freely distributed to non-pay sites only.
Questions/comments to:
David Pinero
dpinero@prodigy.net
http://pages.prodigy.net/dpinero
