Dartmoor Gliding News - Wednesday 22 February 2023

Yesterday's mild weather in the warm sector gave way to the cold front during the night.  So the temperature was noticeably cooler today in the north westerly wind. The rain showers forecast for the day made their appearance in the form of Granite Snow (hail), to use the Met Office term.

"The Force is strong with those that get DI for glider in rain"

So a chance to continue work on K-8, FXB, and finish off the annual inspection. Last Saturday Sean and I installed the new floorboard that Colin had made after Sean had covered it with the same non-slip material as used on the new floorboard in K-13, FSD (Ed: Aren't we getting posh!). Adam and Colin had been working on both wings. Today we had a chance to admire their work.

So who is Yoda in this picture?

Wings duly admired, Colin and I continued to work on FXB's wings and were assisted later on by late arrival Alasdair Barclay.  Scratch continued welding and grinding on the AMF trailer.  Dave Bourchier serviced and made up spare wheels for the glider tyre cabinet and worked on the winch drogue parachutes.

Mike Jardine and Hugh Gascoyne were the Duty Instructor and the Basic Instructor today, respectively. But Hugh didn't have any visitors booked to fly so he didn't have to cancel anyone due the forecast of on and off rain and low cloud.  But after some ground lectures for today's trainees Guy and Andrew (Ed: Andrew sadly had to depart before getting to fly) we went flying. With low cloud, showers, a damp airfield; we just got K-13, FSD, out.

Daily inspection complete, FSD heads up to the cross track before turning right (Ed: No first class treatment for FSD today then?)

Mike flew three training flights with Guy; straight flying, trimming.  Guy reports that his flying got progressively worse as the wind increased (Ed:  So the first flight was a fluke then?).  Mike then gave Steve Fletcher a flight in the rear seat as preparation for his Introductory Flight Pilot rating.  Steve soared for 12 minutes and then had to leave the airfield to attend to some club paperwork at home having bagged what was thought to be the longest flight of the day (Ed: That jinxed it then).

The predicted showers present DGS members with a rainbow

Guy prepares to "fly straight and in trim"

He starts to rotate

And then enters the full climb

Initially conditions weren't that promising aloft

But that doesn't deter Guy from practising his straight flying

The view to the east

Recency flights were flown with Mike Bennett, John Smith and Hugh Gascoyne (the latter from the rear seat).  Peter  took a pair of solo flights too.

John prepares to aviate

The view to the north dappled in winter sunshine

And then one could see the sea to the south

The distinctive shape and colour of Blackdown

This was a typical sky today as seen from the ground

The sun did breakthrough on occasion (Ed: I see that the Fleet Manager still hasn't received the email about the DGS standard car colour.  To misquote Henry Ford "...any colour as long as it is white").

The afternoon presented a curious mixture of low cloud streets and thermic activity

Hugh stands ready to launch FSD again

This cloud street ran all the way to Princetown and was laden with hail showers.

As seen from the winch.  Alastair launches to make use of the enticing cloud street to achieve the "flight of the day"

Elwood (front seat): It's 106 miles to Chicago, we've got a full tank of gas, half a pack of cigarettes, it's dark and we're wearing sunglasses.   Jake (Rear seat):Hit it.

 The soaring pilot's view of the runway (Ed: Are you sure its still February!)

When the work in hangar was nearing completion we sent Alasdair up to the launch point to fly. He had a set of three flights including a soaring flight in the north west- south east street that had set up which ran all the way to Princetown on the moors.  Nineteen minutes of soaring to a height of 2,100 feet AGL allowed him to claim "Man of the match".  It went down hill after that with a short circuit followed by a launch into an approaching hail storm.  The instructor had planned a hangar landing with Alasdair lapping up the details of the need for a different circuit, the need for a different reference point, and the need for a different stopping point by the cross track.  Mike's pep talk must have been convincing as, with the hail starting to bounce off the canopy and a glance to the other instructor on the field (Ed:  Ahh! That was what the gesticulation was all about), he promptly gave Alasdair a practice launch failure and a land ahead (Ed: So it was still a hangar landing then, but I will concede that these instructors can be tricky! But well done Alasdair for flying it and getting it back on the ground in a timely fashion). 

Alasdair maintaining a good lookout as he tops out at 2,100 feet AGL under the cloud street.

Late in the day we welcomed temporary member Valerie Keily, who I flew on 21 January, back to the airfield.  She had come to take some photos (Ed: Valerie, if you had put your name on the flying list you could have flown today...).

Our club diplomat magnanimously offers Valerie a lift back to the clubhouse, after the last launch, in his green machine

And so we packed up which was a quick evolution with only one glider to put away.  I loaded three rubbish bags into my car for disposal at home only to find that the Morrisons "bag for life" contained the remnants of Mike Bennett's lunch.  (Ed: Anyone fancy a very ripe French cheese?).

 

Fifteen flights on a day I had, wrongly, assumed that we wouldn't fly.  The weekend looks promising with high pressure giving clear skies - wrap up warm and don't miss out. 

Why we fly all the year round - for those unexpected days

Gavin Short