Not sure if it was down to the forecast of showers all day or the partial lockdown of Tavistock for the Dartmoor Marathon, but there were only 6 six pilots at the club today. After one of the forecast showers things looked brighter so we decided to make the most of the day. The twin Astir DSL was taken to the east end launch point. First flight was at 10:07 with Phil hardwick completing a couple of launch failure practices to be cleared for BI duties in the Twin Astir.
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| Phil preparing for his flights. |
Viktor Skochko and Ed Borlase each had a couple of familiarisation flights in the Twin Astir. These were their first couple of flights in glass fibre ready for conversion to the Astir CS77 in the near future.
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| Viktor getting ready for his first flight. |
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| The airfield from the Twin Astir. |
Before Ed flew with me he had an experience flight with Steve Fletcher. Andy Davey also re-familiarised himself in the Twin with a flight with me.
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| Steve and Ed. |
It was time for me to get some more hands on experience in the Twin Astir. I took Viktor for a flight and we were lucky to contact a good thermal and climbed to 2300ft. Viktor was happy for me to start exploring how the aircraft operated near the boundaries of the flight envelope. A couple of stalls and a failed attempt to spin wwhich resulted in a spiral dive gave me some more confidence. On the next attempt to spin the aircraft departed from normal flight. The recovery was easy and after recovering from the resulting dive we hadn't lost a great deal of height. Some gentle flying down we were soon in circuit for landing. Flight of the day with 19 minutes.
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| Back safely to terra firma. |
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| Time lapse as seen from the ground. |
The last two flights both Phil and Steve each took turns to take charge of the Twin.
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| Steve and Phil ready. |
Only 11 flights but all gained valuable experience with this new aircraft to Dartmoor Gliding. Thanks to those who came out today and all enjoyed what flying was done.
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