Dartmoor Gliding News-Friday 26th August 2016

Today started out with a seemingly endless blue sky. Very quickly though ( before 9am ) there were signs of the day over developing. Would this ruin the day. A closer look at the forecasts and atmospheric sounds suggested a reasonable thermal day tending to go blue ( no thermal related clouds ) as the day went on. Good. Off to the airfield then.

The great news today was the return to the club fleet of K13 G-DDMX and the Zugvogel G-CHXV. This only happened because several members along with Colin and Area Technical Officer John spent a very busy day on Wednesday sorting out duplicate inspections and the necessary paperwork. The two K8's remain in maintenance but are moving forward.

The availability of the two K13's was very welcome as we had a full programme of club flying and visitors.  We welcome two One Day Course Candidates,  Harry Eastwood and Alan Wood as well as Steve Foxon, SueThorne, and Stephen Wood who visited for Introductory Flights.

One Day Course Candidates Alan Wood ( left) and Harry  Eastwood

Steve Foxon enjoyed his Introductory flight

Stephen Wood talking to club member Dave Bourchier
before his Introductory Flight 

It was soarable right from the first flight. Low down conditions were somewhat difficult, but with care and a little skill, pilots could climb well enough to reach the better ( and easier ) conditions above about 1500 feet. By mid afternoon conditions were mostly blue. Most thermals did not have any cloud above to betray their positions but in some ways this can make things easier as there is no cloud shadow to interfere with thermal generation.

Best flight of the day was by visiting Shennington pilot Clive Smith who disappeared in his beautifully presented K6e for 2 hours and 44 minutes. It was very pleasing to see local pilot Dene ( Scratch ) Hitchen soaring in his Astir for the 2 hours that he needs to finish off his Cross Country Endorsement. Well done. Barry Green celebrated the return of the Zugvogel to the fleet by soaring it for just over an hour returning to make it available for others to use.

Visiting Pilot Clive Smith with his very tidy K6e

Often in the blogs, the club training gets hardly a mention even though this continues throughout every flying day. Today was no different but it was good to see that it resulted in Bob Sansom flying solo again.

Bob Sansom about to resolo in K13 G-DDMX

Thanks, as always, are due to everyone who helped run the airfield, especially Barry and Heather for winch and retrieve respectively.

A great day.

Steve