Today was a day of one half: the second. Starting the day with a uniformly steel grey cloudscape, some shape gradually became evident as the cloudbase lifted until, at lunchtime a patch of blue (big enough for a Dutchman’s trousers) was seen and heat to be felt. And so we set off with a K-13 and K-8 for the east end launchpoint (the forecast wind being north-westerly). On arrival we found the wind to be exactly the contrary: southerly with a hint of east in it (but never enough to provoke a change of ends).
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| Colin Boyd prepares for flight in club K-8 FXB… |
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| …and safely gets away. |
Ray Boundy flew the weather check and quickly found smooth lift to cloudbase at 1,500ft agl. Responding to the call Ed Borlase then took the K-8 away for almost an hour, achieving over 2,000ft. Karon Matten took her first flight of 2021, and Colin Boyd maintained currency prior to playing in his first live pub performance for over a year.
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| Rich Roberts in his Discus on approach. |
In the expectation of continued improvement Richard Roberts then ‘threw’ his Discus together… Sadly, the cloud began to disperse as blue patches became the majority, thus curtailing his ambitions for a late cross-country, although – returning from the winch (Guslaunch) – Peter Howarth managed a creditable 16 minutes in the K-8. New member Peter Gulyas continued his progress with three flights in which he made his first landings at the east end – with a 90° crosswind – well done, Peter.
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| Ed Borlase using the ‘follow the buzzard’ centring technique… |
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| …which seemed to work as he approaches cloudbase at 2,000ft. |
A day which unexpectedly gave us twelve launches where we thought we were going to have none and which was to the credit of the assembled few (including those who didn’t fly) for their flexibility and teamwork.
Martin Cropper
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