Fuel farm
Small fields refuel at a single pump. Once airlines arrive you need a fuel farm – a proper depot that is filled by road tankers and serves aircraft with fuel trucks.
Pump versus fuel farm
Your grass field starts with a fuel pump holding 3,000 litres. Pilots taxi up, pull the tank trailer over and refuel themselves – fine for light aircraft, hopeless for a turboprop that needs hundreds of litres per turnaround.
The research Fuel depot (Ground handling branch) unlocks the fuel farm, fuel trucks and the Purchasing post in your airport management. It requires asphalt taxiways and service roads.
How supply works
- A depot holds 60,000 litres and costs 120,000 € to build.
- When stock falls below half, a new delivery is ordered from your fuel supplier.
- Road tankers drive in along the country road and unload for about half an hour.
- A road link is mandatory: a road or service road must run from the depot to a country road, otherwise no tanker can reach it.
- A delivery can fail – the supplier then tries again a few hours later.
When the tank runs dry
Nothing stops completely. Aircraft are handled without refuelling, but you earn nothing from fuel sales, airlines grow unhappy for every flight that left without fuel, and a warning appears. With a bit of planning this never happens.
Earning money
You buy fuel at the market price plus your supplier's markup and sell it to aircraft at a fixed price. The difference is a steady income – the more and larger aircraft you handle, the more it adds up.