Category: Flying Reports

A day of Fabulous Festive Flying.  No soaring on offer but the views were simply stunning.  With fog in Newbury, all along the A4 and through Hungerford the prospect of flying seemed fairly low but driving up the hill from Shalbourne one emerged from the fog into sunshine and a clear blue sky.  From the air the extent of the fog could be seen and more than one person commented that it was rather like being at the seaside (hm, can’t say I’ve noticed green beaches anywhere else).  Here’s a taste of the views (photo’s by Jeremy K).

Despite the light SSE wind (on the ground) there were reports of launches to 1,900′ in the K8 and 1,700′ in a K13.  Only 2, of the 25 launches, went into double digit flying time.  Rob J’s 11 minutes pipping Paul B by a minute to take longest flight honours.   We were pleased to welcome a couple of visitors from other clubs.  Tim (son of Adrian N) from Bristol Uni Gliding Club (based at Nymsfield) and Chris from The Park.  It being a Wednesday eatable goodies appeared – mince pies from Adrian N (just to remind us of the season) and a delicious home made cake from Tony P.

Misting forced an end to flying before we ran out of light.  After packing the toys away it was time (for some of us at least) to descend into that blanket of fog.  Colin B paused on the way home to capture one last memory of the day.

 

It certainly was worth slipping Wednesday a day to enjoy the winter sunshine (while storm Barbara was introducing herself to those north of the border).  It may have been the second shortest day of the year but we still manage to clock up 36 launches of up to 2,000′ (in the K8 naturally).  This week we didn’t manage to break anything (as far as I know) and even got JPC rigged (and flown).  Paul B did his usual – set the target for longest flight at 12 minutes.  Half an hour later John D clocked up 16 minutes thanks to a bit of westerly wave.  That wasn’t bettered (but I managed to equal it – yes, I managed to fit in a solo – thanks Ken R for the back seat help).  17 of the launches did get into double digit flight times.

Not only was there lots of flying but plenty of eating too with mince pies (with the opportunity to compare those from Sainsbury and Waitrose), lardy cake and home made sausage rolls.

 

 

In all my years flying at Rivar Hill I can’t remember a day when we’ve broken so many things.  Bigger things maybe but not as many.  For starters there were 4 weak links.  Even the K8 broke a link.  The breaks weren’t just down to sods law but due to the wind.  South with some East, not particularly strong on the ground but decidedly stronger as you climbed.  The challenge was getting to the top of the launch without either breaking a link or having to abandon due to an excess of speed.  Jeremy called it “launch lottery” and described sitting with no hands on the throttle watching a glider waving off.  With the cross wind element it was a challenge avoiding dropping cables over the fence on the western side.  Too much layoff and risk the cable dropping over the electric fence to the east (which happened once).

Despite delays imposed by the launch problems and the short day (not long until the shortest day of the year) 19 people flew 27 launches.  On the second launch Paul Bryant set the time to beat – 9 minutes!  Alan B, Alan S and Rowland P managed to match that time but it took Colin B (in the Vega) to smash the time with 13 minutes – he found a little of the fabled east wave.

Almost forgot – the rest of the breakages? Puchacz wheel dolly got run over and one of the arms of the cable tow-out trailer snapped.