I had been flying with WCATC since 2001. I really enjoyed the comraderie and warm, fun atmosphere Jeff Jung, Andy, and the other controllers provided over the years, giving us an all-voice ATC alternative experience to VATSIM's frustrating "type-while-you-fly" ATC system a few years back. In its heyday, Westcoast provided one or 2 sessions per week, and an email reminder system to let you know what was going on. There were a ton of 'regulars.' but over the years they dropped off one by one, and the sessions went from 2-3 controllers down to a single controller, and became fewer and far between, to the point where the emails stopped altogether, and the Calendar took on it's current blank appearance about 8-12 months ago.
These past months I have rediscovered VATSIM, and since you no longer have to text to fly, it is fun to fly there again. I'm not sure what you're talking about regarding the background hum or noise you describe when keying the mic, but if you've ever listened to real world ATC on an aircraft radio, you will quickly realize that the sound effects programmed into Squawkbox really does sound like its real-world counterpart. As a heavy metal airline jockey at heart, I truly enjoy the discipline of planning and executing an IFR flightplan utilizing current real-world routes, SIDS and STARS. Programs such as ForeFlight for iPAD now give us the ability to flight plan in real world conditions, providing real-time weather and the ability to watch a little blue depiction of your plane move along your course on the various charts and approach plates, all running wirelessly on a different computer than FSX. A typical flight at VATSIM will find you talking to 2-4 controllers, everything from Clearance Delivery to Tower to Approach, provided you check first with monitoring programs like Wazzup to see where the action is in the virtual ATC world. There is ALWAYS something going on somewhere.
Just My 2 cents, and miss the boys at WCATC,
Alex Christoff
Baltimore, MD
