Dartmoor Gliding Society Club News: Dartmoor Gliding News

Sometimes with the weather timing is everything. Today we were in the quiet weather between two named storms. Storm Eowyn moved away from our area yesterday to be followed by Storm Herminia due to arrive tomorrow. Today though the weather was surprisingly quiet. What little breeze there was wafted in from the South / South west. The sky was blue and became a little hazy later. RASP was even forecasting some thermals for the middle of the day but this proved to be as hopelessly optimistic as it sounded.

Early morning heading towards the airfield

We fielded a single K13, a K8 and the Astir which were efficiently prepared and taken to the East End Launch Point. The promised early start was somewhat delayed while we wait for the frost to dissipate from the wings ( the weather had to have it's say after all ).

Getting ready to launch

All flights were circuits but useful to help maintain pilots currency. Longest flights were those in the K8 which wafted around at minimum sink to extend flight times to 8 minutes from the nil headwind launch height of about 1300ft, Too many pilots shared this accolade to be listed. It was nice to see junior pilot Jamie Young adding to his solo score and then later flying as ballast for Steve Fletcher in the K13.

Take up slack

Up the wire

Crossing to the north to high key

Down wind

Final Approach

Jamie and Steve

Teasingly, to the south there was a convergence visible for a large part of the day which may have provided some entertainment but it remained stubbornly out of reach only arriving near Tavistock as we were packing the gliders away.

The hangar was a hive of activity today with Colin working on K13FGR annual inspections while Adam was working on the Puchacz refitting the battery box.