Another day with a very modest turnout. The stiff 90 degree cross-wind and the forecast of a better day on Sunday probably explained why only 7 folks flew on Saturday but 20 flew on Sunday. Number of launches (and number of folks flying) was the same as Wednesday but this time cloud base was 3,700′. The cross wind meant modest launch height and therefore there wasn’t much time to find a reasonable climb (i.e. climb rate>drift rate). Rowland very kindly took most of the short flights and the rest of us had some reasonable soaring. I claimed longest flight time with 56 minutes – which included a little help from the western ridge, the first time I have ever found anything there.
Sunday 31st August
Good soaring conditions along with a light WNW wind gave us plenty of extended flights and produced many in excess of an hour.
Chris B in his LS7 set off to the west getting as far as Westbury Chimney before the approaching sea breeze stopped him from venturing any further. Unfortunately Chris managed to get back which was a shame as I was looking forward to making use of my fully charged video camera so that I could take revenge for him filming Carol and I’s land out at Urchfont the previous weekend 🙁
Despite a flight time of 3:08 this was not the longest flight of the day as Trevor, flying his Jantar, clocked up a very respectable 3:38 on his flight to Swindon……..almost landing out I hear.
Cirrus pilots Rob Jarvis and Chris Keating flew HAX for 2:15 and 1:24 respectively whilst Paul Prentice, Steve Gaze and James Walters had over the hour each in the K8 and Vega.
Uncharacteristically some of the shortest flights of the day were flown by Liz but as I was putting her through her 5 yearly instructor checks and I was suffering from a bout of yellow bungitis I suppose Liz could be forgiven 🙂 Glad to say that after the customary exercises a signature in her logbook was duly applied. I would like to point out that the offer of an XC flight in the Duo Turbo next weekend did not affect the outcome at all!
Between the first flight at 10:47 (only cut short when the winch started moving towards the launching Puchacz) and the last at 18:19 we clocked up an quite reasonable 38 launches totalling about 21 hours 45 minutes.
All in all a very enjoyable day.
Saved by the Comps – a Rather Bendy 100K
As recounted in Chris’s ribald tale, Saturday met promised much but delivered somewhat less. I launched just before Phil and Carol and climbed away, bemused by the ‘ground fumbles’ thwarting their attempts to get airborne. By the time they launched I was at 3500 QFE and heading west – so just for once didn’t have the frustration of chasing a mystically buoyant Janus disappearing into the distance. The nominated task was round the Danger Area, but the sky didn’t look like it would it would permit such an endeavour (at least not in an LS3 with me flying it at half past one in the afternoon). A top up at Burbage found me going like the clappers to keep out of a cloud street and shooting past Pewsey with little loss of height. The sky ahead said ‘proceed at your peril’, but a couple of ‘kamikaze kids’ from Lasham who I had been watching diving earthwards into the distance suddenly zoomed up over Devizes. So, the sky being less threatening behind than in front, the possibility of a stock 100k presented itself.
So in and out of Devizes and straight into a rain shower. To the north east, Marlborough was invisible under a deluge, so the only option was back the way I had come. Unfortunately the cloud street that had delivered me with such dispatch was now drifting over the Danger Area, so the return trip saw me scraping along the red line under the overcast in what little good air there was left behind. At Upavon just enough height for a straight glide back into Rivar. Then glory be! – a hang glider thermalling in a small pool of sunshine. Arriving just beneath him each climbing turn pushed me too close for comfort, so there followed an asymmetric gavotte requiring much effort but yielding little in return. Then right on cue another couple of kamikazes pulled up in a thermal close by; so join them and back up to the comfort zone. By now there were three deluges in sight, east, west and south and all the time a wall of of water creeping towards Wantage. But having chickened out once, I owed it to reliable old EEFy not to wimp back into Rivar without at least a bit of effort.
A line of cumulus had developed towards Newbury and a gaggle appeared over Vernham Dean. While there’s life there’s hope! So top up with the gaggle and head north ahead of the storm. The ‘old reliable’ thermal at Hungerford provided impetus to keep going and a solitary Cu under the overcast near Brightwalton delivered a welcome 4kt. Then a race against the rain to get to Wantage and stay dry, a final distant thermalling glider leading me home for tea.
I have to record my gratitude to the Lasham young bloods who marked most of the thermals on this most unusual flight and condolences to those who suffered the Icarian fate in the fields below. Their contribution to my enjoyment was immeasurable. (Even if they scared the bejazus out of me every time they set my Flarm flashing scarlet!)
I was tim who wasnt steve whilst nigel was peter (sunday 24th august)
I think everyone else who turned up was themselves and pretty much every flight stuck apart from the first 2 and Nigel in the K8, but no shame in that, he only flew it because he’d flown and soared the entire fleet upto that point and felt it would be rude not to aviate in dha.
Chris managed to defeat the karma of the previous post and didnt land out and Tony learnt why we lookout all the time and especially behind the upper wing before coming out of a turn, having shared a gaggle climb with a bunch of junior champs pilots.