SBBR - SBGL
Brasília–Presidente Juscelino Kubitschek International Airport - Rio de Janeiro/Galeão – Antonio Carlos Jobim International Airport
OK, this post is going to make you fall off your seat when you see the stunning scenery of Rio. But first things first.
We take off from Brasilia, the capital of Brazil’s federal government, and proceed south east to the coast.
Not much to report here, the Live weather has been simply fantastic the last couple of days, and we power off the TBM’s Pratt & Whitney turboprop and climb all the way up to 28000 feet.
Like the flight to Brasilia, I broke the IFR flight plan and proceed manually in VFR mode. Rio is a city we need to explore more carefully.
As we are coming from the northwest, we turn south looking for the coast. We are going to do a low flight south of Christ the Redeemer. The sim did not disappoint. Look at this scenery:
Shot of Christ the Redeemer in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. In the background, the Sugarloaf Mountain (Pão de Açúcar) in the Guanabara Bay.
The statue, named Cristo Redentor in Portuguese and Spanish was built between 1922 and 1931, in a collaboration between a French sculptor, a Brazilian and French engineer and a Romanian sculptor. It is 30 meters high and overlooks the city of Rio.
That little read dot in the top center of the picture is our TBM
At this point, I’m speechless. Look at the magnificence of this. This is a flight simulator for Christ’s sake. And here we are, admiring one of the world’s wonders in all its glory. Wonderful job Microsoft. I cannot emphasize this enough; this flight sim is a revolutionary piece of technology which will change the way we interact with the world forever. This flight sim is a showcase of what’s possible. This has been Satya Nadella’s message all along. After this, companies will start building breathtaking virtual representations of the world which will amaze and impress us every year more.
But we are not done yet with Rio. Cause we need to check the crow jewel of Brazil’s football history: The Maracana stadium:
The Estádio do Maracanã, officially the Estádio Jornalista Mário Filho, was first opened in 1950. The stadium used to fit over 150000 people, but its capacity got reduced to just over 78000 as part of the renovations for the 2014 FIFA World Cup. It is Brazil’s biggest stadium (the second largest being the Brasilia stadium, which we flew over during our last flight).
Finally, on final visual approach to runway 11R:
The airport’s name (Rio de Janeiro/Galeão – Antonio Carlos Jobim International Airport) has carried the name of the famous Brazilian musician since 1999. Antonio Carlos Jobim is best known for his bossa nova, including The Girl from Ipanema, Aguas de Março, Agua de beber, Corcovado (name of the hill where Christ the Redeemer stands), Dindi and many other world-famous songs of the genre.
This is, so far, the best flight we’ve done, in terms of scenery and landscape.