Aerosoft/sim-wings have recently updated their rendition of Adolfo Suárez Madrid-Barajas Airport (LEMD) for X-Plane 12, bringing SAM improvements, airport functionality tweaks, and more.

It was constructed in 1927 and opened in 1931, with commercial operations starting two years after the official inauguration. It was initially unpaved, and the paving process only began in 1940. 

The National Terminal, now T2, was inaugurated in 1954 after mere months of construction. It was considered a first-class international airport in 1957.

Terminal 1 was constructed in the 1970s during the air travel boom, which was a direct consequence of the advent of the Boeing 747. It reached 4 million passengers yearly during the period that led to its construction.

In the 1990s, the terminals saw further expansion, which happened again with the construction of Terminal 4 in 2004, significantly increasing its passenger handling capabilities.

With a yearly average of 61 million passengers, it’s the busiest airport in Spain and the 5th busiest in Europe. It’s a hub for Air Europa, Iberia, Iberia Express, Iberia Regional, Plus Ultra Líneas Aéreas, and World 2 Fly, and an operating base for Iberojet, Ryanair, and Wamos Air. Aegean Airlines, Aer Lingus, Aeroméxico, Air Arabia, Air China, Air France, Air Transat, British Airways, Brussels Airlines, Cathay Pacific, Delta Air Lines, Emirates, Finnair, Korean, LATAM Brasil, LATAM Chile, LATAM Perú, Lufthansa, Transavia, Turkish, United Airlines, and WizzAir also serve it.

Update 1.1.0 brings a hefty changelog, which follows below:

SAM Configuration:

- Fixed broken jetway animations

- Fixed broken VDGS/Marshallers

- Added Marshallers to every Ramp that did not have one prviously

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Airport Functionality:

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- Fixed taxi network not loading (solves issues with various addons such as traffic or follow me car addons)

- Optimzed taxi network

- Optimized ramp starts configurations

- Optimized runway setup, fixed missaligned displaced thresholds

- Added missing ramp starts 

- Fixed ground layout not showing on map and airport selection screen

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Ground Traffic:

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- Fixed ground traffic not working

- Added more trucks, routes and destinations

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Ground:

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- Pavement uses new high resolution ground textures (including PBR normal maps and weather effects)

- Added reflections to all markings and ground signs

- Added weather maps to all ground textures, markings and signs

- Added new ground effect layers for details and dirt

- Replaced and enhanced tyremarks

- Fixed some ground markings (I/II/III signs) being reversed

- Added water body polygons for lakes, rivers and other water bodies

- Fixed a draw order issue with ground markings

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Vegetation:

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- New volumetric grass placed all around the pavement areas

- Grass now changes color depending on seasons

- Replaced trees with new XP12 native 3D trees supporting seasonal variations

- Added many more trees inside the orhophoto area

- Removed unwanted autogen based vegetation inside the orthophoto area

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Orthophoto:

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- Added alpha mask to the orthophoto borders to better blend with surroundings

- Updated ortophoto colors and brightness to better blend with surroundings

- Added normal maps to the orthophoto

- Added seasonal orthophoto variations

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Surroundings:

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- Removed some old facades representing the urban area behind the old terminal

- Added customized autogen around the airport

- Added customized road networks around the airport

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Terrain Mesh:

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- New Custom Mesh based on XP12 base tile with support for soundscape and seasons

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The scenery is available on the Aerosoft Shop for roughly $25.60, requiring at least 7.5 GB of free hard disk space to install.

Stay tuned to Threshold for more flight simulation news!

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