Dartmoor Gliding News - Saturday 10th January 2026

 Day started with the airfield quite wet as Rick introduced a new idea to keep the runway as healthy as possible, so the K13 was to be launched on the south side of the track and the K8 which was launched on the north side of the track. 

Me Elliot and Jamie taking up the K13
with a small cloud street parked underneath Mary Tavy 

First to fly was Elliot who practised stalls and lookouts with 3 really good landings and circuits, he is majorly improving and is on track to going solo in no time.

I took the first flight in the K8 to see how the conditions where, once at the top of the launch it was lovely and sunny, very stable for the whole flight, once I stared circuit I saw the quad bikes with hounds taking off all around the airfield this would last most of the day. 

Me taking off in the K8 for the first flight in it.

Rick then took Ian with him into the sky to do overall practise with some circuit planning and launches. After Ian was Val, and as Rick stated after Val’s flights. “That was Val’s best landing ever”. 

K13 ready to fly.

Moving to the solo pilots, Jamie launched and got the day topping flight of 13 minutes which he got after launching under a nice dark cloud. After that flight, John Allan took a quick 6 minute circuit to then relieve John Smith who was on the Winch for a couple hours. John Smith then took 2 flights in the K8 to keep current to fly. 

Lastly, Rick and myself flew the last flights with Rick flying solo in the K13 and myself in the K8

My view from the K8 flying over the church

Rick in the K13 flying near the church to start his circuit 

Meanwhile, down at the hangar the "technical elves" were busy. Peter Howarth's Kestrel was weighed. Weighed??? Yes gliders need to be weighed every 10 years to calculate the centre of gravity position and it's load carrying capacity. The Puchacz was also weighed and then de-rigged ready for it's annual inspection.

The Kestrel set up on the scales

And now for the Puchacz

After cleaning all the gliders and drying them for the next flying day we ran into a problem, due to the Puchacz being de-rigged do its ARC, we had a game of “How many gliders can we fit into a hangar” which lasted for about 20 minutes until the Dgs team rubbed their brains together and formed a solution to the problem.

Some mystery person had locked the door,
as Rick pounds on the metal to see if anyone can open the door 

Overall a very nice day, for all glider pilots to keep their recency and training up to standard, very calm conditions to get some good circuits and landings in, thank you to everyone who winched today, this includes James, John Allan and John Smith. Thank you to Allison for driving the retrieve until the afternoon and my Mum for driving it for the rest of the day. 

Zack