At least in Australia, and so I would assume the rest of the world, edge lighting is omnidirectional for the first few stages of lighting intensity. The highest intensity stages are directional but the lower stages remain visible from 360 degrees. It goes without saying the high intensity stages are only installed at a small handful of airports and most just have 1 lighting stage visible from all directions.
Otherwise think about it, how are you supposed to fly a circuit at night? It’s nearly impossible in this sim without aid of Gnss since you can’t see the runway while downwind.
I worked in airport operations years ago. While the FAA owns the approach lights, the airport proprietor owns the airfield lighting, including runway lights, and pays the electricity bills. I can guarantee that anytime the tower controllers had all of the runway lights cranked up for no good reason, even at night, we would remind them of who pays for the power and to turn them off.
So during the day the lighting would certainly be off unless visibility required them to be turned on. As for approach lights, they should also be off when the airport is VFR (during daytime). An additional problem with the sim’s approach lights is that they are visible from far too wide an angle, and from too far away. You shouldn’t be able to see them on the downwind leg, for example; they’re directional and pointed back toward the approach.
Finally, whether daytime (IFR) or nighttime, only the runway lights on the active runway(s) should be on. Flight Sim always has all lights on on all runways, which is generally inaccurate (though in real life, I did encounter certain controllers who would come on shift and immediately turn every light on the airfield up to max - we had to remind those folks to turn the unnecessary lights off and keep the others at a lower level unless an aircraft was having trouble finding the field). The primary reason that airports try to limit lighting to the current active runway is for safety, to reduce the potential for landing on the wrong runway.
I remember when I was getting my private pilot license, finding airports was hard at first. I would love to see the lighting as an assistance option, but have the airport lighting, including the rotating beacon, reflect the real world. A bit too easy to spot the airports in good weather. I can see how some people might appreciate the help, but I would like it to be realistic.
Here in the US at our airport the lights are Omni directional the only thing that looks different is the last 1000 feet has a split lens white/amber but only 1 LED the REILs are Bi-directional green/red separate LEDs. Our lights are on a photo cell as we are a non-controlled field. I can however bypass the photo cell manually but it’s a walk to the light vault! LOL
When runway lights are on, you can see them from all directions including when flying the circuit. If they are pilot controlled, they are on a timer. I learned to reactivate them on final so they don’t shut off at the worst time, short final.
Hi,
Is it possible that after 12, I repeat 12 updates, the runway and approach lights are STILL visible all the time, even at daytime with full sunny days???
It is one of the bad design decisions in the simulator. Either the devs are unable to fix it because it is so deeply coded in the sim, or they simply don’t care (or are not aware).
Still under investigation according to the latest development update (#33). I echo the two posts above, really wish to see no approach lights during daytime VMC.
PAPI should be visible but everything else turned off.
Also, why are the default taxi signs so washed out and bright at night? They should get GAYA (designers of Asobo LSZH) to re-art the default taxi signage
