Look how you like ... Your Airways OR our airways OR

Leading Estonian virtual airline, since 2008.

%
OF ALL EETN/TLL FLIGHTS IN VATSIM
%
ON TIME PERFORMANCE
+
DESTINATIONS
+
FLIGHTS
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BLOCK HOURS
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PASSENGERS

INTRODUCTION

Your Airways, founded in 2008, is the leading virtual airline from Estonia. We are operating flights to destinations located all over the virtual world, from Alaska to Australia. All flights are operated in real time, in VATSIM network (we are considering PilotEdge). Our goal is to offer our pilots - clients, the best possible virtual airline platform in the world. Your Airways is privately owned by JH Group.

Scroll trough our virtual home to find out who we are, why we are and what we do. We are sure that you would like to join our team of skilled and professional pilots and staff.

Some of our Principles 

that may be different from your current virtual airline

Leave the teleportation to Star Trek

All of the aircraft start the flight from the location it landed. Pilots may change a location, if needed, from one base/location to another. All flights shall be flown in real time, time acceleration is also prohibited.

Sharing is caring

We have a limited number of aircraft, so specific tails will be shared between (2-4) members. You wont get a dedicated aircraft in Lufthansa, neither with us. This may require some coordination between our members. Be ready for that, book an aircraft for that Friday fly-in already today.

As Real as it gets

All flights have to be operated according to all rules, regulations and procedures. If the performance limited takeoff weight for a specific airport at given conditions is n number of tons, then you can not take off if heavier than that. We are watching you!

Hidden dictatorship with a taste of democracy.

Most of the decisions, related to airline operation are done by all of the active members. This is accomplished by system of voting. Each active member can vote. Members vote weight is based on factors like activity, seniority and contribution. Each member may introduce an idea for voting. Our management includes CEO, COO and assistants.

Speed has never killed anyone. Suddenly becoming stationary, that's what gets you

If the aircraft (and a pilot) is involved in an serious incident or accident, caused by gross negligence or willfully, then (Houston,) we have a problem. The faith of the aircraft and pilot will be decided by voting. It may be possible, that the specific aircraft will be a write-off and the pilot has ... perished with it (meaning excepted from our memberlist). We hope that it does not happen and we do not have to activate our "dark site".

Cheating on us. 

There are no activity requirements ... but you will be marked "not flown in 30 days", if you have ... not flown for us in pastr 30 days. We do not prohibit- nor like if our pilot is flying for some other (virtual) airline. You may receive a note from the management, especially if the other airline is one of our competitors.

Our goals and values

Our goals we thrive to achieve

BE SAFE

First priority for Your Airways is safety. Our goal is to be accident and incident free airline. We encourage everyone to report all system bugs, hazards, incidents and occurrences that could affect the safety of our operations. Reporting is done via our Intranet system. Your Airways has a “Just Culture”. This means that we ensure, that no action will be taken against any pilot or other member, who reports a safety concern or other issue, unless such disclosure indicates, beyond any reasonable doubt, that the event was caused by gross negligence or is a deliberate or willful disregard violation of regulations or procedures.

BE COMPLIANT

Aviation is one of the most regulated fields in the world, there is a procedure and/or rule for almost everything. When it comes to the implementation of real rules, then virtual aviation is not that regulated. That is where we come in. Our staff has a real life experience with different regulations by EASA, ICAO and IATA. We have tried to implement those rules to our every day operation as much as practicable. This starts with our training- and pilot ranking system and ends with contingency fuel- and flight planning procedures. We use real world aircraft manuals, standard operating procedures and guidlines.

BE REALISTIC

It is common that virtual airlines are advertised as “most realistic”, “most professional” and cliches similar to that. Over the years, our pilots and staff have been members of various different va-s and they have concluded, that we are definitely one of the most real world experience oriented va platform. We do not compare our landing rates or count meaningless virtual money. We offer an environment, that is similar to real airline briefing systems and EFB solutions. We are structured as a real airline and try to follow real world procedures, rules and regulations as much as practicable.  

Values that make us different

COMMUNITY DRIVEN

Estonia is a small country, our virtual aviation community is even smaller. Most of our members have met in real life to have a chat, share knowledge or have a beer or two. Our members have also arranged fly-ins and group flights. Your Airways internal facebook group has grown to be the only VA group in Estonia, now named as Estonian Virtual Aviation Association. It is a place tho share news, ideas and knowledge about virtual aviation. It also offers a dedicated downloads section for Estonian related sceneries, liveries and much more.

VIRTUAL AVIATION EXPERIENCE

Virtual aviation, as a niche hobby has existed for a long time. Some of our members have been using flight simulators for over 10 years. They have seen sims, such as FS95 and even past that. This means that they have seen add-ons to evolve and solved countless issues with their simulators. Their experience is handy if a newcomer has a problem and the simulator does not behave. Our members combined have logged tens of thousands of virtual flight hours and visited almost every corner of the flight sim world. Some have experience with scenery development or livery design.

REAL WORLD EXPERIENCE

Some of our staff and pilots are working in the aviation industry in real life. We have flight dispatchers. Some of our members have a real air traffic control background or are working as an real world ATCs at Tallinn tower/radar unit. On top of that, we have several private pilots or theory instructors. We also have two CPL/ATPL pilots. And it gets even better, we have a real Airbus A320 first officer, operating for major European airline. This kind of real world know-how is extremely valuable and has helped us to develop our virtual airline to the level it is today.

What our members say

Quotes are actual and we did not pay to them

"Functioning staff, well analyzed and interesting routes, clear flight planning system, active, helpful and professional crew"

Martin
RANK: CPL CAPTAIN
MEMBER SINCE 2018
"If you are looking for a professional VA with an elaborate web environment based on real life experience and procedures, look no further!"

Heinrich
RANK: ATPL CAPTAIN
MEMBER SINCE 2013
"Your Airways is a good VA, because here, pilot is a full member of the airline, who’s opinions matter and wishes are taken into account . Here is a close group of people who are fanatics of virtual aviation."
Oliver
RANK: INSTRUCTOR
MEMBER SINCE 2012

History, as short as possible

Over 10 years of virtual aviation

10 years is a long time, when we started, FS9 (Microsoft Flight Simulator 2004 - a Century of flight) was the main platform, pilots flew on 2D panels and 1080 resolution was still to come. To put it to a perspective, then iPhone was introduced only a year earlier, than the idea to start an independent Estonian virtual airline - Your Airways, was born. Many things have changed over the time, so have we.

As with every project, real or virtual, there are ups and downs. We have seen bad times and great success as well. Running a fictional airline in a small country, like Estonia, with only 1+ million residents is not so easy. Real life Estonian airlines have a challenge to find enough local passengers, we have had a similar challenge of finding local online flying pilots. Beside the challenge, we have managed to attract more and more of the niche hobby, flight simulation, users from the country and introduced them to the world of online flying. This smallness of us is actually beneficial and unique. Most of the other virtual airlines in the world cannot say, that majority of their members has met in real life and had a beer of two with each other over the years.

Virtual aviation, as real aviation, is a dynamic environment. As in real world, many external factors may change the face and focus of the airline, they can even cease the operations. We are not driven by fuel prices or the economic situation of the world, but we are heavily dependent on the networks we operate and even more – the add-ons for the simulator. If there is a new state of the art aircraft add-on or scenery, we must react, so that our pilots could enjoy up-to-date graphics and features.  Here is our story, as short as possible, divided into periods.

Before ANNO

before 2008 | JP Air

Roots of Your Airways go back to the late summer of 2008 (and even before that) when two of the founding members, Heigo and Johannes discovered the wonderful, then ahead of its time add-on, called MADDOG 2006. We flew for several different airlines, like Dubrovnik and Blue1 - both closed for today, as there was no MD80 operator from Estonia.

It did not take long, until we found a start-up airline, called "JP Air", from TLL. We had a way to fly from Estonia with MD80. The real JP Air was supposed to start operations with MD80, but the plan never materialized. We did not know it yet. The aircraft were painted according to sketches from their web-page and the operations started, this time from Tartu. Tartu was selected as there was no usable scenery for Tallinn (capital of Estonia), and the founding members were from Tartu. Tallinn airport was also going through a major reconstruction at that time. We synchronized the schedule and post-flight data in excel and it started to become too complex. We needed a solid VA platform. We also needed to break off from any real airline, so that the developments of the real world (like closures, changes in fleet and destinations, etc.)  would not affect or restrict our decisions.


 

And then it all started

2008-2009  | JH Air

Evaluations of different virtual airline software solutions led us to phpVMS. As we started to go online, a new branding and name was needed to be separated from real world JP Air, so the "JH Air" (ICAO: JHI, IATA: JH, callsign: Dorpat) was born. As we can see, only one letter of the initial name was changed, some are joking that JH resembles the initials of founding members. We went online on 24th of December 2008, we still consider that "easy to remember" date as our official birthday. Original paint was really close to the JP Air, but with green variations. Greenish/blueish colors have been with us since. Call “Dorpat” comes from the historical name of Tartu. From the beginning, a fundamental principle was established - each and every aircraft should depart from the airport it landed. Aircraft and crew can not be involved in accident.

So now you know why JH, JHI and "Dorpat".


 

New bases and JH Group

2009-2012   | flyJH - "We take you and your luggage to the same destination on time ... every time"

Over the next years, our number flights increased, Tartu was becoming too small for us and there was still no scenery for Tallinn, so we opened new bases out of Estonia. We have been operating from Dortmund, Hamburg and London/Gatwick. We opened some new subsidiaries for cargo and worldwide operations and introduced some new types, like MD-11, Boeing 747-400. All this needed some management and therefore, a holding company, JH Group, was established.  Visual identity was changed from "JH Air" to "flyJH". We have also used City Express livery on the MD80 fleet. Some of the MD-s were refurbished to VIP and business configurations. Before the retirement in 2012, our MD80s had operated around 730 flights and 1700 flight hrs. We had couple of pilots and operated slightly above 200 legs per year.


 

Period of growth

2012-2015  | flyJH - Your Airways

In 2012, computer hardware had developed and FSX was becoming usable on most of the PCs of the time. It was a time for an upgrade. After the release of the PMDG NGX, the Boeing 737-900 was introduced to the fleet. In 2013, PMDG Boeing 777-200LR was also added.  With the introduction of new fleet, additional change to the branding was made. Now the name was changed from "flyJH" to "flyJH - Your Airways". Y was painted as swallow (national bird of Estonia), so the logo could be read in two ways - Your Airways and (Y)our Airways. New Estonian virtual pilots joined and the number of flights peaked at 845 per year in 2013.

After years of success, previous managers of the airline took a well deserved "vacation”. The number of operations started to decrease, but it was still around 550 flights/year in 2014. During this period, our 777s operated around 300 flights and 1300 hrs and 737s operated around 1500 flights and 2900 hrs. This was achieved by less than 10 active pilots.


 

Good decisions and bad decisions

2015-2017 | flyJH - Your Airways & virtual Estonian Air

Situation was changing. Founders and managers of the airline did not participate in daily operational control anymore. We were somewhat tired. The JH Group needed more flights and new direction. There was high demand for something called virtual Estonian Air - OV. JH Group had the interface and systems to do that. So we listened to our potential pilots and started virtual OV. We uploaded all real life OV schedules, even most of the historic ones. We prepared everything and the project went online. But several things went wrong. First of all, although, there was “a high demand” for virtual OV, the actual interest faded away relatively quickly. Secondly, the “promised” Aerosoft CRJ release was postponed, postponed and postponed again, so we were missing the main type of the airline. Thirdly ... real OV ceased operations in 2015. All of the sudden, there was no real airline but we were still there.

OV and JH operations by JH Group continued in declining trend in 2017. Owners of the airlines even discussed the closure of JH Group | flyjh - Your Airways. We learned that all of the decisions have to be calculated and you should never make fundamental changes to the principles that have proven to be successful. We lost the face and by in mid 2017, all flights had stopped.


 

Wind of change

2017-...  | Your Airways - "You call it the world ... we call it the home"

After some discussions between owners and members, it was clear that the stars have aligned once again. Like almost 10 years ago - we had a top of the line add-on – fslabs Airbus A32X and there was a group interested in flying with that, from Estonia, in our colors. Many former members asked to continue with the project and that’s so we did. At this time, flyjh was dropped from the name and the airline was re-branded to “(Y)our Airways”. The entire website and intranet system was rebuilt from scratch, moved to a new domain and servers. New livery was designed, schedules added and the off we went again. After the launch of the new re branded Your Airways, we saw a whopping 86 flights in first month and 139 after that. Your Airways was back and we celebrated our 10th birthday. When we started, the airline operated 200 flights per year, now we are seeing peak activity of 200 flights per month, that translates into to roughly 35% of VATSIM TLL traffic. On some months, we area operating close to the numbers of Finnair from Helsinki and even beating Air Baltic from Riga.

We are proud what we have achieved. The founders of JH Air never imagined, that the small "two-man" airline project wold grow to operate 1/3 of the VATSIM flights out of Tallinn, that we can do over 1000 movements per year and that the our call sign - "Dorpat" will be well known in our area of operations in VATSIM network. Big thanks to everyone, who has contributed to Your- Our Airways over the years.

SYSTEMS, TOOLS AND INFRASTRUCTURE

Our backbone
IntranetV

All information about our operations, statistics, downloads, documentation and much more is "hidden" in our Intranet system, powered by heavily modified phpVMS, integrated with Simbrief, Navigraph, VATSIM, OneDrive and other vendors. The system has been designed to mimic real life electronic flight bag, running on a separate device, such as iPad, Surface or similar. V stands for version 5, that was initially released at the beginning of 2018. phpVMS was selected, as it is one of the most robust and easily editable locally installed virtual airline platform. Pilots are not dispatchers, so the system is designed to require minimal user input while offering realistic working environment for the pilot.

e-OFP our heart

Everything you need for a safe flight

Inspired by real systems

System is designed by people who are involved in the EFB system evaluation, implementation and development in real life. Our inspiration has came from Aviobook, IFS, Taillog.

Made by real-life knowhow

The coding is done by real world dispatchers who know how to prepare a safe and efficient flight.

Realistic flight plans

Our system is fully integrated to Simbrief platform, displaying accurate planning data. Our pre- and post flight data is analysed, fuel burn factors are kept up to date (even for a specific add-on).

Support

Our team keeps the system up to date. Our in house support is ready for bug reports or new design ideas.

Easy to use prepare

The system was designed to require minimal input by the end user, the pilot. Just select the flight, edit departure time (plus some optional fields) and off you go.

For tablets (and desktop PCs)

Entire system works well on PC but is designed to be a best fit on the tablet, such as iPad.

Easy to use

Everything you need is just at your fingertips, starting with W&B and fuel data, live weather maps, FMS input examples and ending with aircraft specific checklists.

Integrated

Our system provides quick access to various functions, such as Navigraph charts, live weather map, aircraft tech log, etc.

Note that you will need a Simbrief.com and Navigraph.com accounts.

Our fleet
Most sophisticated add-ons for FS

Your Airways was founded due to one aircraft - maddog 2006, it was ahead of its time. Add-on featured things never seen before in one package. Like visual icing effects, working flight data recorder, working circuit breakers, separately dimmable panel lights and much more.

Next big thing was PMDG Boeing 737 NGX, that also rised the bar for desktop flight simulation.

Flightsim labs A32X series is our current main workhorse.

There is no place for Ctrl+E in our airline. Your Airways continues to select best available aircraft simulations for the fleet.

Mainline
Airbus A32X

Your Airways mainline fleet contains 8 ETOPS 180  certified Airbus A320-214 aircraft.

Our route network requires short- to medium range aircraft. Most of us were "Boeing pilots", as there has never been a complex Airbus simulator for desktop computers. After the flightsimlabs A320 was released, it was clear that this is the next big thing. Even the life long Boeing lovers started to turn their heads.

The aircraft features realistic fly-by-wire flight characteristics, complex fuel, electrical, hydraulic and other systems with extremely detailed textures. More than that, the aircraft features very good and dynamic sound set, data-link simulation, visible icing, integration with GSX and much more. It is being continuously developed and updated.

(Prepar3D: flightsimlabs | X-Plane: flightfactor)

Other types
on Demand

Everyone likes some change, so do we. Other aircraft types are available as the pilots have requested. Reasons may be different, someone does not like Airbus, someone does not have hardware to run fslabs, some are needed to cover longer flights over the oceans.

  • To compliment our A320 fleet, we also offer Boeing 737-800.
    (Prepar3D: PMDG/NGX | X-Plane: Zibo)
  • Boeing 747-8 was selected for our long-haul ops as one of the most complex widebody simulation.
    (Prepar3D: PMDG)
  • McDonnell Douglas MD-83 is our special asset. We have restored our first aircraft, ES-JMA. It is used for group and VIP charters.
    (Prepar3D: flythemaddog | X-Plane: Rotate)

Our Bases
Cities by the bays

When the lights go down in the City and the sun shines on the bay ...

Your Airways operates from two hubs:

  • Tallinn Lennart Meri Airport EETN/TLL, Estonia

    We are Estonian virtual airline, so Tallinn is the obviously choice for our main hub. Your Airways generates about 35% of the entire VATSIM traffic to/from TLL. Tallinn airport scenery is made by Drzewiecki Design, its runway is almost 3500 m long, making it suitable for basically any type of aircraft.

  • San Fransisco International Airport KSFO/SFO, California, United States
    SFO was selected as our 2nd hub in at the beginning of 2019. Western coast of US has one of the most variable and scenic landscapes in the world. Even one hr flight can take you over oceans, rivers, deserts, mountains and valleys. Scenery by Flightbeam studios.

Destinations
from Anchorage to Zurich

Your Airways has operated to more than 100 airports all around the world

Our scheduled destinations include major metropolitan cities, such as London, New York, but also to a smaller places like  Yellowstone in US or Greek islands in Europe. All of the destinations are selected based on high quality scenery availability from developers like UK2000, FSDreamTeam, FlightBeam, ORBX, Turbulent, flytampa and so on. As a real airline, we also operate on seasonal schedule. Some of the destinations are for winter, some for summer. Schedules are revised at the beginning of each season when members can suggest and vote for new airports. We try to keep the number of destinations relatively low, so that pilots would get familiar with airports.

We also operate charter and ACMI flights to basically whatever destinations.

Current Route Map

On the road again, I just can't wait to get on the road again

Map feed from our intranet system. If map is not displayed then reload the page

HOW TO JOIN YOUR /OUR TEAM?

Requirements for entry

Professional and well trained crew is cornerstone for a safe operation

In real life, you could never take a command of transport category (multi engine, multi crew) aircraft on a commercial flight, without having at least 1500 hrs.

Pilot ranking

Our ranking system is described in our operations manual part D and is an interpretation of EASA FCL rules. We recruit commanders/captains only. The lowest entry rank is "green captain". It requires minimum of 150 online hours. This is the magical of hrs a soon to be pilot will receive during the Integrated CPL course (on fixed wing aircraft). We think that this minimum threshold shall ensure that the applicant has a general understanding of online flying, related procedures and software. There are more ranks available.

Theoretical knowledge requirements (extract from OM-D)

An applicant for a captain position shall demonstrate a level of knowledge appropriate to the privileges granted in the following subjects:

a) Air Law,
b) Aircraft General Knowledge — Airframe/Systems/Powerplant,
c) Aircraft General Knowledge — Instrumentation,
d) Mass and Balance,
e) Performance,
f) Flight Planning and Monitoring,
g) Human Performance,
g) Meteorology,
i) General Navigation,
j) Radio Navigation,
k) Operational Procedures,
l) Principles of Flight,
m) Instrumental Flight Rules (IFR),
n) Communications. 

Practical operational and flight skills requirements (extract from OM-D)

The applicant shall demonstrate the ability to:

(a) operate the airplane within its limitations;
(b) complete all maneuvers with smoothness and accuracy;
(c) exercise good judgement and airmanship;
(d) apply aeronautical knowledge;
(e) maintain control of the aeroplane at all times in such a manner that the successful outcome of a procedure or maneuver is always assured;
(f) understand and apply crew coordination and incapacitation procedures, if applicable; and
(g) communicate effectively with the other crew members, if applicable.

Type rating

Your airways does not provide type rating courses, each and every applicant must ensure that he/she is capable of operating the requested aircraft type in accordance with manufacturer specifications, rules, regulations and standard operating procedures. Your Airways does provide manuals and support for our mainline fleet.

Our type rating requirements are based on EASA FCL and found in our operations manual part D.

Type rating syllabus(extract from OM-D)

Applicant shall demonstrate knowledge on aircraft type on following topics:

(a) Detailed listing for aeroplane structure and equipment, normal operation of systems and malfunctions
(b) Limitations
(c) Performance, flight planning and monitoring
(d) Load and balance and servicing
(e) Emergency procedures
(f) Special requirements for extension of a type rating for instrument approaches down to decision heights of less than 200 ft (60 m)
(g) Special requirements for ‘glass cockpit’ airplanes with EFIS
(h) Flight management systems

Status of our recruitment system is OPEN

Your Airways is currently looking for new pilots or staff.

Recruitment procedure

Who sayd it has to be easy

1. Pick one of the options from our current vacancies below:

FOR BEGINNERS
A320/B737 GREEN CAPTAIN

min 150 hrs. in VATSIM

ref: EASA FCL Appendix 6-Modular training courses for the Instrument Rating.

one aircraft types
MTOW < 136 000 kg
ETOPS prohibited

FOR ADVANCED USERS
A320/B737 CPL CAPTAIN

min 700 hrs. in VATSIM

ref: EASA ORO.FC.A.250 Commanders holding a CPL(A)

two aircraft types
MTOW < 136 000 kg
ETOPS authorized

FOR EXPERIENCED USERS
A320/B737 ATPL CAPTAIN

min 1500 hrs. in VATSIM

ref: EASA FCL.510.A ATPL(A) Prerequisites, experience and crediting

three aircraft types
no MTOW restriction
ETOPS authorized

  • - exceptions to the minimum requirements may be done by the management if the applicant has experience from other networks, provable offline hours or real life experience. 

2.Crosscheck that you meet all of the requirements:

  • As all of the flights are currently operated in VATSIM network, pilot must meet all of the requirements stated by the VATSIM, found at https://www.vatsim.net/documents.
  • Minimum hours requirements for the applied rank is met.
  • Applicant shall meet the minimum theoretical knowledge requirements as stated above. Your Airways may request a theory exam.
  • Applicant shall meet the practical operational and flight skills requirements as stated above. Your Airways may request a practical flight test.
  • Applicant shall be able to operate the requested aircraft as described in type rating syllabus above. Your Airways may request a theoretical exam and/or practical flight test.

3. Send the application

    4. Verification and evaluation process

    Each application will be review by the staff of Your Airways. Provided information will be validated. Your Airways may request additional details and theoretical exams to be conducted.

    5. Interview

    Applicants who pass the verification and evaluation process will be contacted to schedule an interview. It should take around 15 minutes. Interview is usually done via Skype or Discord.

    5. And you are done

    If the applicant meets all of the requirements, has passed verification and evaluation procedures and has had a successful interview, the access to the Your Airways systems will be granted.

    Welcome to our team!

    Pilot will go through a brief training about our procedures, documentation and Intranet system. This is usually done via Skype or Discord. Pilots may be required to do a line training, meaning that the flights will be monitored by our staff, pilots are assisted and instructed as needed. After that, you will be reaalsed for unsupervised flights in Your Airways colors. Lucky you!

    Contact Us

    Contact us by e-mail, facebook, discord or simply fill and send the contact form on the right. We do our best to reply to you as soon as possible.

    Please note that our official facebook group is co-hosted with Estonian Virtual Aviation Association.

    Headquarter


    Tallinn Lennart Meri Intl AirportTartu mnt.101

    10112 Tallinn, ESTONIA

    US OFFICE


    San Francisco Intl Airport T2
    PO Box 8097
    San Francisco, CA 94128-8097

    Get in touch with us via: