Dartmoor Gliding News – Saturday 15th March2014

Part of the life of a glider pilot is given over to monitoring weather and soaring forecasts and this is no different for me. I had been monitoring the potential forecasts for today since last Wednesday. The atmospheric soundings were strongly suggesting wave. Sharp inversion ( less than 2000 feet above sea level in this case ), wind strength increasing with height but maintaining a constant direction, north westerly in this case.

The atmospheric sounding for 1pm Saturday showing the inversion, increasing windspeed with height, and a fairly constant wind direction. It also suggests very little in the way of cloud cover

North westerly? Surely Dartmoor Gliding only gets wave in easterlies? Only one way to find out; off to the airfield. The sky was full of wave clouds, lenticulars, wave bars, etc. There was a complete absence of the signs thermal activity. That strong inversion and high pressure is responsible for that.

Henry in the K13 with instructor Ged with Stefi in attendance

Henry and Ged about to commit aviation into a dramatic sky

There was a full training programme with junior Henry Flower working towards solo, Stefi Guiu working towards her General Flying test, old hands Jeff Cragg and John Blaskett working towards solo after their winter layoff, Rick Wiles and Mike Jardine working towards an air experience flying rating.

What cloud there was showed an extensive wave system

So, did they find the wave. Well, yes they did. It did not go very high. Less than 2000 feet. Flights of half an hour were common place and the wave bar was aligned with our north ridge so access was easy from a winch launch. Longest flight of the day was by recently solo junior, Andrew Swann, who logged 36 minutes in the K8. He is making a habit of doing this.

The view from the K8 taken by Andrew looking down on the local cloudscape

My only regret was that I had not rigged my own aircraft so that I could have used it’s extra performance to explore the local area properly. Easy to be wise after the event. I should have learned that lesson years ago.

Elsewhere around the airfield the testing of the winches continues. The bad news is that the ML winch is still unacceptably down on power. The diesel fitter with be summoned again. The good news is that the Guslaunch winch brakes are now working and it is back to two drum operation. Some work was being done at the hangar to the roller to make it heavier.

The instructors look cosy at the Mary Tavy Inn.
Missing from the photo was Bob Pirie who was on family duties, Martin Cropper with car troubles
and me behind the camera.

At the end of flying, after the kit was put away, the instructors made a quick exit to the Mary Tavy Inn for their periodic meeting. This went on well into the evening but was not really much hardship in the convivial surroundings. Great choice of venue Don.

Steve