1 April 2005
To All Of Our Pilots,

This month, we celebrate the fifth year of SimAirline.net operations. Although Virgin International Airways and Midway Virtual both opened in March 2000, the first flight was not until April 22, when D. Paul Sibert opened Midway service by flying from Raleigh/Durham to Columbus. The first Virgin flight was two days later, when Lee Dring flew Virgin Atlantic's London Heathrow-Johannesburg service. Over 59,000 PIREPs and five years later, SimAirline.net is a strong organization of virtual airlines with worldwide service and quality, and we have you to thank for it. Let's make the next five years even better.

Changes to Inactivity Rules
Effective immediately, our inactivity policy no longer allows pilots to file for inactivity "until further notice." There have been concerns about pilots filing for such status often never returning and thereby taking up roster space and not accurately reflecting our membership. The new maximum inactivity length that can be file for is twelve months, although it can be extended by refiling. All pilots currently inactive until further notice have had their inactivity length set to one year past the date they filed. They will be removed from the roster if they do not fly or file for an extension as per our regular inactivity policy.

Monthly Goals for Expansion Revised/Virtual Icelandair Announcement
As the results for our latest poll indicated, a large number of pilots feel that our monthly goals for virtual airline expansion are unreasonable. As a result, we have adjusted the goals (from 1:11/12/13 to 1:10.67/11.33/12.00), decreasing the PIREP ratio requirements, but increasing the retention goal (from 76/78/80% to 78/80/82%). I can not stress enough the importance of asking when you are unsure about something, especially in flying or filing PIREPs. There is never any harm in asking a question, only harm in failing to ask. Because we did achieve the adjusted monthly goals, falling just short of the original goals, I have decided that Virtual Icelandair will open later this month. Our next virtual airline to be added is AOM French Airlines.

Swissair Operations to Include Balair
Balair, the one-time charter airline for Swissair, will be added to Swissair Virtual's operations this month. Balair flies 767-300ERs from Zurich to Ciego de Avila, Colombo, Male, Mauritius, Puerto Plata, Punta Cana, and Varadero, all of which are new destinations for the virtual airline.

South African Virtual to Add Air Tanzania Operations
South African Virtual will soon include flights of Air Tanzania, which South African Airways currently maintains a 49% ownership stake in. Air Tanzania flies 737-200s and Dash 8-300s from their base in Dar es Salaam. New destinations include Kilimanjaro, Moroni, Mtwara, Mwanza, and Zanzibar.

A Reminder When Filing PIREPs
Because of the numerous time zone changes from daylight saving time adjustments, some PIREP forms have a link to a separate PIREP page, which you should use if the simulator date was before the time zone changes. Please be sure to observe such instruction to avoid any PIREP errors.

New Management Hiring
SimAirline.net is now hiring for two new management positions, AOM Fleet Manager and Scenery Developer, in addition to ongoing hiring for Aircraft Developers and a new Marketing Director. The purpose of the Scenery Developer is to create airport scenery from scratch for airports that are not in the simulator. To apply for either position, please go here.

Thank you all for contributing to the first five years of SimAirline.net's success.

Aaron Robinson
aaron.robinson@simairline.net
AOL Instant Messenger: SimAirlineNet