Christchurch
All charts for Christchurch (NZCH) are available from the VATNZ Website.
Recommended add-on scenery for Christchurch is listed here.
Christchurch (icao: NZCH; iata: CHC) is New Zealand's second largest airport and the primary arrival point for air travellers visiting the South Island. It is also the main forward base of operations for the flight programme to McMurdo Sound in Antarctica.
It has three runways: runway 02/20, a parallel grass runway 02/20 Grass, and the cross runway 11/29. As in real life, runway 02/20 receives the vast majority of traffic in the online world. Runway 11/29 is not used in heavy traffic situations due to a significant misalignment of that runway between the FS9 and FSX sceneries.
RNAV Arrivals
Runways 02 and 20 are equipped with ILS and all of the NZCH arrival procedures feed into these approaches. All STARs are now RNAV only. Pilots unable to fly the RNAV arrivals should indicate this in their flight plan, and inform controllers on initial contact in order to receive vectors to the ILS approach.
Flights from Port Vila can expect to be assigned one of the IGEGA arrivals depending on the active runway:
- Port Vila → Christchurch Runway 02: IGEGA FOUR ALFA (IGEGA4A).
- Port Vila → Christchurch Runway 20: IGEGA FIVE BRAVO (IGEGA5B).
Flights from Sydney can expect to be assigned one of the BELEE or AVOCA arrivals depending on the active runway.
- Sydney → Christchurch Runway 02: BELEE ONE ALFA (BELEE1A) or the AVOCA THREE ALFA (AVOCA3A).
- Sydney → Christchurch Runway 20: BELEE ONE BRAVO (BELEE1B) or the AVOCA THREE BRAVO (AVOCA3B).
All of these arrivals cross over the Southern Alps, the most mountainous section of the entire Oceania region, and there are a series of descent steps specified as part of the arrivals (see the charts above). Aircraft on these arrivals should descend to the ATC cleared level via the published steps.
Departures
Flights departing Christchurch for Port Vila can expect to be assigned one of the following departures depending on the active runway.
- Christchurch Runway 02: NUBKA ONE PAPA GLENN TRANSITION (NUBKA1P.GLENN).
- Christchurch Runway 20: BIDEV ONE QUEBEC GLENN TRANSITION (BIDEV1Q.GLENN).
Flights departing Christchurch for Sydney can expect to be assigned one of the following departures depending on the active runway.
- Christchurch Runway 02: BAVEM ONE PAPA VANDA TRANSITION (BAVEM1P.VANDA).
- Christchurch Runway 20: KADET ONE QUEBEC VANDA TRANSITION (KADET1Q.VANDA).
For the Cross the Ditch event, the official Christchurch to Port Vila route travels via Auckland.
This is not the most direct route (which is approximately five minutes shorter), however it replaces roughly sixty minutes of flying over empty seas with the scenery of the South Island's Kaikoura Ranges and the western and northern coasts of the North Island.
Pilots taking part in the event are STRONGLY encouraged to file the event flight plan rather than the real world one.