Hello, with the AIRAC cycle 2509, all STARs and APPs for VQPR (PARO) have disappeared in Navigraph/Simbrief. Due to the difficult terrain around the airport, it is literally impossible to fly airliners to this location from today on. Will this be fixed?
Gretings from Germany
Stefan
Servus Stefan,
We never offered any terminal procedure for VQPR (Paro). I have now looked back at AIRAC 2401—no procedures for this airport were included. So they have not disappeared; they are simply not existing.
The reason seems to be that the AIP Bhutan doesn´t provide such information; therefore, they are not included in the charts nor data. But we can ask the reason … 
Cheers
Richard
Please check again. My backups only go as far as cycle 2402, but the STARs and approaches were offered back then, and all the way up to last cycle 2508.
For example, X-Plane 12 native data for VQPR:
2402.VQPR.dat.zip (1.7 KB)
2508.VQPR.dat.zip (1.7 KB)
2509.VQPR.dat.zip (263 Bytes)
Regards,
Tim
P.S. the charts are gone too with this cycle, the procedures were also charted by Jeppesen before.
VQPR data/charts have been officially withdrawn and are therefore no longer available.
Thank you
Richard
But can we just have that back in? Paying for unlimited subscription and having one of the most fun and challenging approach in the world just vanish is kinda fun breaking…
But that’s the real world - you expect real-world data/charts, and we offer it - you pay for it and get it.
We did not make this decision, nor did we filter it out. It was a decision made by the government of Bhutan. That has nothing to do with the data provider; no data provider (including Lido) longer offers these data/charts.
Sorry,
Richard
PS: possible I can add the data back in one of the next cycles, but not the charts. There is no way.
Sure the data alone would be fine ,charts we can dig the old records for the unrealistic challenges, but the missing of the nav data for approaches is really sad, please add back the data points and approaches SID data back, thanks
Having the data back in a future cycle would be nice, especially if no new (official) approaches are added to replace them.
Regards,
Tim
Hi Richard,
thank you for your explanation. I just wonder how pilots in the real-world approach VQPR today. Any ideas without NAVData and Charts? Is there a way to reimport/overwrite those older NAVData and Charts for this particular airport into SimBrief and NaviGraph Charts?
Greetings from Germany,
Michael
Hi MIchael,
We plan to add the VQPR procedures as tailored records in the data. As I have mentioned here, not the charts.
Hope that helps,
Richard
Either the approaches have been made private but still exist, or Druk Air have their own procedures and charts which are also not public. It’s also possible the airport is currently VFR-only?
Regards,
Tim
They have their own local VFR procedure. So what they put in into the FMS only TAKTI and then PRO and then PR and then after that is route discontinuity. Latest Just Planes video in Paro has the captain explain their company VFR procedure. No airline ever use the RNP AR procedure as far as i know until it’s withdrawn now.
It’s very unlikely the Department of Air Transport of the Kingdom of Bhutan to republish the RNAV procedure in the future as the construction of Gelephu International Airport is now underway and it will have a 3000 m runway, possibly equipped with ILS CAT I + much less obstacle surrounding the airport.
Christo
Hi Christo,
these are really good news for real-world pilots! Nevertheless a little bit sad for virtual-world simmers… I just love flying old routes, remember the final to Kai Tak? 
Michael
Thanks Richard and everyone for the explanations above — really helpful to understand why the VQPR procedures aren’t included anymore. I’ve been in the rabbit hole for two days trying to work it out.
I’m currently working on the VNKT–VQPR route in MSFS 2024 using SimBrief and Navigraph for a project I’m developing.
For testing and training purposes, I’d still like to replicate the iconic Paro curved valley arrival (PR888–PR7xx sequence).
A couple of questions:
What’s the best practice workflow for simmers in this situation?
Build the en-route portion in SimBrief and then manually add the valley fixes in Little Navmap or MSFS?
Or is there another cleaner way people are handling this?
Richard, you mentioned the possibility of adding tailored records back into the data (but not charts) — is that still under consideration, and would that allow the PR888–PR7xx waypoints to appear in navdata again?
Appreciate any guidance or tips from others who have already worked through this.
Thanks,
Fraser
Hi Fraser,
First, thank you very much for your input and for posting here. I´m not sure if I´m the right person to answer all your questions in such a professional way, but I will try. All others, please feel free to support me here and to offer Fraser here a good (possibly better) answer
The removal of VQPR is a bit tricky and was also a surprise for us. The problem is that they have also removed the waypoints PRxxx from the database, so you can´t really enter them manually in the FMCs. What would I recommend?
So, my personal recommendation is to wait for the next AIRAC cycle or add the missing PGxxx waypoints as custom waypoints in our charts (or LNM). I guess this is a lot of work, even when you have all the coordinates of these waypoints, but I don´t have any other idea for such a situation.
I have written “wait for the next AIRAC cycle”:
Yes, we will add the VQPR waypoints, arrivals, and approaches as tailored records starting with AIRAC 2510. So, you can expect all these PRxxx waypoints and the removed terminal procedures from 2510 in all datasets, including the MSFS2020/24 data. As with all other tailored records (especially for historical airports), we can only offer the data, but not the charts, to these airports. The same happens for VQPR; there are no charts. Sorry.
Anyway, I hope this answer is (at least partly) good enough to help you plan your next steps. Again, VQPR will be back with the next AIRAC 2510
Cheers,
Richard
Hi Richard
Thanks a lot for the clear explanation, that really helps. I’ve been pulling out what little hair I have left over the last couple of days. Tried all sorts of workarounds. Computer said no to everything. So glad I found this community this morning.
I’ll revisit Paro once AIRAC 2510 is out. Can you tease when it’s due?
For context, I’m working on a project around the world’s most challenging real-world approaches, so Paro was top of the list. If you or anyone else has suggestions for other airports that really test both the pilot and the sim, I’d love to hear them.
Thanks again
Fraser
AIRAC 2510 will be released on Oct 2nd …
Ping @jsokoloff 
Jason possibly has an idea - he is our specialist for such questions in our team
Cheers,
Richard
Thanks again Richard, your guidance, much appreciated.
Hello, I welcome you to check out our blog post section where once a month we go to different challenging airports. https://navigraph.com/blog/vqpr We have completed 19 of them. Enjoy
Hi Jason. Thanks very much indeed! Exactly what I need. Can’t wait to get reading. Looking forward to the next cycle. Thanks for the support everyone.