18th Annual Boston Tea Party LIVE! [19 August 1200-1900 ET]

[Krikor Hajian]

Planning is well under way for the 18th Annual Boston Tea Party; LIVE and in person from Nashua, New Hampshire!

We hope that you will join us for the 18th Annual Boston Tea Party, live from scenic Nashua, New Hampshire.  With over 20 controllers from Boston Virtual ARTCC coming together in one room, the ZBW airspace will be lit up for the afternoon.   Join us for a casual GA flight, or participate in our Airport Poker competition for some amazing prizes. 

For more information, including Tea Party Poker, giveaways and operations within Boston airspace, visit the 18th Annual Boston Tea Party website. We look forward to seeing you on the scopes on August 19th!

[Krikor Hajian]

The 18th Annual Boston Tea Party website is now online! It can be viewed here, and contains important information about Tea Party Poker, giveaways, and participating in the event. Our sponsors include HiFi Simulations, TFDi Designs, ORBX Simulations, Plantronics and FlyTampa! Visit the 18th Annual Boston Tea Party website RIGHT NOW to find out how you can win these amazing prizes! Get hyped! We're just over a month our from the Northeast's biggest and greatest live event!

[Krikor Hajian]

BVA’s biggest event of the year is just around the corner! On August 19, beginning at 12pm ET (1600Z), we’re staffing up Boston Center for more than 7 hours. In addition to enjoying full coverage at Boston Logan (KBOS), we strongly encourage pilots to fly into the many regional airports in our airspace that will also be staffed. You can expect coverage at airports like Hartford-Bradley (KBDL), Providence (KPVD), Manchester (KMHT), Albany (KALB), and across Cape Cod.

If you are flying in the event, please read BVA’s Letter to Airmen before connecting. The document covers important information about flying in our airspace, and provides an overview of gates, taxiways, and procedures at Boston Logan Airport.

Before flying with us, please ensure you:
   1. Download updated scenery for KBOS from the links below:
        a. For BVA Members using FSX or P3D
        b. For other FSX or P3D users
        c. For X-Plane users
   2. Download this plug-in for X-Plane, if you are an X-Plane user

Updating your KBOS scenery is important for pilots of all simulation platforms. The default scenery provided in the simulator will be missing critical runways and taxiways, making it challenging for our controllers to sequence you with other traffic. (If you use other updated scenery, such as the payware version of KBOS available from FlyTampa, your airport will be compatible with our updates.)

Throughout the event, pilots can participate in Tea Party Poker to win prizes from FlyTampa, HiFi Simulations, Orbx Simulation Systems, Plantronics Gaming, and TFDi Design. Each flight that lands in the Boston Center airspace qualifies for at least one playing card; at the end of the event, the pilot with the best poker hand wins. There are prizes available for runners-up, and for anyone who participates in Poker.

While Boston is always a popular destination, we will be staffing many of the regional airports in our airspace. Given the levels of traffic this event usually draws, arrival or departure delays are quite likely at Boston. Pilots wishing for expedited service, as well as Tea Party Poker participants, are encouraged to fly into or out of the regional airports that are staffed.

Many of our controllers will be participating live from a location nearby the real-world Boston TRACON facility. At the end of the event, controllers will need to vacate the venue. While we expect to transition to off-site ATC coverage by 7:00pm, pilots may experience delays departing to or from KBOS between 6:00pm to 7:00pm while the transition takes place. Particularly during this time period, pilots are strongly encouraged to fly to or from other ZBW airports (which will not be delayed) during this time period.

For the latest information on the event, including full rules for Tea Party Poker, please visit the Boston Tea Party webpage: http://www.bvartcc.com/Events/BostonTeaParty.aspx.

[Krikor Hajian]

We're just two weeks away from Tea Party 2017! Don't forget to check out the Boston Tea Party 2017 Webpage for details on Tea Party Poker and the amazing prizes that you can win!

[Krikor Hajian]

We're happy to announce that we've added not one, not two, but THREE licenses of the recently-released Aerosoft Digital Aviation CRJ700/900X to our list of Tea Party Poker prizes! This brings our total amount of prizes being gievn away to 15! To recap, the total list of prizes that YOU could win are;

• One of 3 Licenses to a Aerosoft CRJ 700/900 X
• One License to any FlyTampa Scenery Product, including the soon-to-be-released KBOS V4
• One of 5 Licenses to a HiFi Simulation Technologies product
• One of 3 Licenses to an Orbx Simulation Systems Product
• One Plantronics Gaming RIG400HX Headset
• One of 2 Licenses to a TFDi Design Boeing 717

We're strongly encouraging pilots to also fly into other airports within ZBW airspace other than Boston. As of this posting, we have full coverage planned for Bradley (BDL), Providence (PVD) and Nantucket (ACK), as well as many other TRACONs and minor airports that will have additional staffing.

For more information, visit the Boston Tea Party 2017 webpage, including full rules for Tea Party Poker and general information about this event. We'll see you all on the 19th!

[Camden Bruno]

Less than 48 hours until controllers begin arriving in Nashua, NH for the 18th annual Boston Tea Party! Interested in winning 1 of 15 fantastic prizes? Visit the Boston Tea Party 2017 webpage to learn how. Before flying, please read the post above for very important information.

We'll see you this weekend!

[Camden Bruno]

Tomorrow is National Aviation Day in the United States. What better way to celebrate than by joining Boston Virtual ARTCC's biggest event of the year?
 
Starting at 12pm ET tomorrow, BVA's controllers will be staffing up our entire airspace for 7 straight hours of air traffic control, most of which will be provided live! Tea Party is usually the busiest event of the year, and more than 30 controllers will be coming together in person to support it.
 
As you know, pilots participating in Tea Party are eligible to win great prizes just by flying our airspace! For each landing within ZBW, pilots can private message Burlington Approach (type ".msg BTV_APP" in your pilot client) to request a card. The more flights you do, the better your chances. To be eligible, flights must terminate in ZBW airspace, and internal flights that start with one Approach facility (e.g., Boston Approach) would need to land within another approach's airspace (e.g., Bradley Approach) to qualify. For all of the details, rules, and a list of the great prizes available to be won, visit the Boston Tea Party page of our website.
 
While our main airport (KBOS) is always a popular draw, we encourage pilots to visit ZBW's many other regional airports. We are planning to have full, top-down coverage at Bradley (KBDL), Providence (KPVD), and Nantucket (KACK), and will have staffing at several other airports across the ARTCC.
 
Join us online beginning at 12pm ET tomorrow.

[Camden Bruno]

The 18th annual Boston Tea Party LIVE event is about to begin! Follow us on Twitter (@BVARTCC) for live updates. View this post prior to your flight(s) for important information.

[Camden Bruno]

The controllers and administration at Boston Virtual ARTCC want to thank all of the pilots who supported the 18th annual Boston Tea Party.

We are excited to announce that we reached over 230 operations at Boston Logan International (BOS) in the 7 hours that we were staffed - this number does not include the dozens of other airports that had coverage. This number also matches the real-world traffic numbers that real-world Boston Logan controllers were handling during the same time period.

Please stay tuned for more information regarding the results of the Tea Party Airport Poker competition. We had over 40 participants, and will reach out to the winners via email within the next few days.

Without your support, we could not accomplish such a spectacular event for 18 consecutive years. Thank you, and we hope you enjoyed as much as we did!