Dartmoor Gliding News-Monday 6th September 2021

 Mr Blue Sky

It was through the wonders of WhatsApp (and latterly Emails) that this soaring day was spontaneously organised. Following an initial post by Richard, an 8-man posse was assembled to try and take advantage of the favourable conditions that were forecast for Monday. I enrolled on the basis that Wednesday did not look good and I would try my hand in the Easterly wind. Malcolm was a late attendee to the party – only picking up the email on the Monday morning!

I got the hangar opened and was soon joined by Richard and Steve F. Richard had seen to it that the winch had already been left out from Sunday in anticipation of a Monday gathering. Nice one Richard – that’s one less job to do setting up. The rigging of gliders then ensued in the increasing heat – there was little or no wind, so we were all suitably sweating as we helped each other with every soaring pilot’s obligatory workout!

We had to take a breather when all was assembled at the launch point, to re-hydrate and to await the arrival of the Cu overhead – surely it’ll start popping soon? The motley crew sank into garden chairs in the shade of the launch hut. Water was supped, sarnies were chomped, apples were crunched, heads were tilted skyward. Still no Cu overhead. So we bullied Martin into taking the first ‘sniffer’ flight in the Libelle on the stroke of 1 o’clock. Exactly 7 minutes later our intrepid pilot returned to report back. The flight duration said it all – rather more challenging than it looked.

Andy took the second cable and was back on the ground after 7 minutes. Good consistency from Team Libelle. More gazing skyward then ensued as the next pair of cables were towed out. 

“You see that little cloud just left of the raggedy white one?
I reckon there’s lift under there.”

It was now nearly 2pm, which coincided with the little upward bump on the RASP chart, so we figured 7 minutes could be improved on. Peter donned chute and boarded the Astir - such was his determined demeanour that I chose to put the K6 online to follow him. He immediately departed the top of the launch to the southwest – had he seen something? I kept my eye on him as I prepared to launch.

The launch itself seemed to have a slow point about a third of the way up but I stayed with it whilst the speed was safe. I had the good fortune to encounter half a knot shortly after release, which I scraped around in for a couple of minutes to maintain height at the very least. I could see Peter a couple of hundred feet above and to the west so I tip-toed over to him. We had an engaging few minutes circling and re-centring, gaining a few hundred feet and buying time. Peter then headed over towards Mary Tavy but I stubbornly hung on to what little lift I had. I could see Richard launch in the Discus but he scurried off southwards not to be seen until quite a bit later! For me however, there followed an extended period of scratching around between 1200 and 1800 feet, which in the hot almost cloud-free conditions was pretty demanding and required fairly tight circling. I was joined at various stages by Peter and Steve, all of us battling for height in close formation. There was plenty of head-swivelling going on believe me! I wish I had had a Go-Pro as it would have made quite a spectacle.

Returning to terra-firma once more I was surprised to find I had clocked up 46 minutes – seemed more like 20 to me. It was around this time we started to have issues with the winch. Something to do with the fuel system drawing in air causing a reduction of power. In the launches that followed there were several slow launches and two aborted take-offs. At the time of writing, I believe Scratch is investigating this – let’s hope it’s nothing too crucial.

From the Northeast, the line of Cu inched towards us but was never in reach.

Due to either deteriorating conditions or the winch issues (or both), the last six launches of the day were short flights or aborted take-offs. There were valiant efforts to rectify the winch fault (heroes, you know who you are!) but the soaring conditions were beyond our control. All things considered, not a bad day given the circumstances. Richard claimed flight of the day with 1 hour 38 minutes – he later told me having reached the line of energy (3100ft C/B) to the northeast he was able to traverse up and down it. The minor places were claimed by Peter (38m), Andy (21m) and myself (46m) before circumstances intervened. Congrats to all other combatants.

The flight log bears out the degree of challenge thrown down by Mr Blue Sky!

With eight of us now on the “Good 2 talk Better 2 Rig!” WhatsApp Group for Licenced Pilots, I believe it’s a useful tool to enable flying (and revenue for the club) where it would otherwise not have happened. There must be other pilots in the DGS membership who should be in this group? Roll up, roll up!

Hugh Gascoyne.