Dartmoor Gliding News - Saturday 13th July 2024

The forecast for today looked ok. Winds light(ish) from the north moving to the west later. 40% chance of rain later, at least that means a 60% chance of no rain. Cloud base was not really going to be high enough for much cross country activity.

Early view from the winch

Visitors today were father and daughter duo Paul and Keira Vango attending for One Day Courses, and Jamie Hubbard for a birthday surprise Two Flight experience. All enjoyed their day and left with smiles on their faces.

Paul and ...

Keira

Jamie and family

The club fielded 2*K13, the Puchacz, the Astir CS77 and a K8. The solo pilots also added A mini Nimbus, Std Cirrus, Twin Astir and a brace of Libelles to the grid. This created a bit of an issue by mid afternoon when everything was airborne leaving very few on the ground to operate the field.

K13 launching again.

It was soarable from just after 11am and was initially the usual struggle low down improving with height. The cloud base improved from about 2000ft QFE to a rather variable 3000ft mid afternoon. Mid afternoon saw the clouds to the south darken and spread out considerably. Surprisingly this cloud cover had some of the best climbs and even had a, mostly hidden, convergence which was enjoyed by John Allan in his Mini Nimbus.

Looking over Tavistock towards Plymouth

Princetown

Meldon Reservoir

Burrator

The convergence just north of Burrator

Classic convergence cloud.

Longest flight of the day was by Andy Davy ( Libelle ) at 3hrs 4min ( I have to claim a moral victory here as I managed to outclimb him at one point while 2 up in a K13!! ). Other notable flights were John Allan ( Mini Nimbus ) 2:17, Malcolm Wilton-Jones ( Twin Astir ) 1:27 and Steve Lesson ( Astir CS77 ) 1:14, and Gavin Short ( Std Cirrus ) 0:53. The two seaters managed several half hour flights while delivering their training tasks.

Man of the Match - Andy

A surprisingly good day.

Steve