September 2008
Monthly Archive
Saturday, 27th September 2008
Hot and sunny today, but no wind. People started ground handling early on, so at 1pm we went up the Mynd, where we sat with the wind 90 degrees off for a few hours. By 4.15pm we decided that enough was enough, so I did my last good deed for the season and sacrificed myself to the wind gods. I bottom landed and two minutes later the wind picked up, came on and everyone had a nice couple of hours soaring.
No blog postings for the next few days as we have no internet access.
Friday, 26th September 2008
The forecast was for lighter winds around here and stronger further south. We chose Corndon over the Malverns for that reason. The mist cleared out early on and we headed up the hill with an increasingly good-looking sky. When we got up to the top, it was howling. The Gyrn was still clagged in and we could see why. We seemed to be in an island surrounded by a sea of low cloud on most sides. Graeme reported strong winds at Bache too, so we did some shopping and then received a 3jam to say it was flyable at the Gyrn.
Lots of people were there and it was scratchy to start with, but by 3.30pm it was nice and thermic, but very smooth. I got to 941′ ATO, which was above the inversion, where you could cruise around without any sink at all. After a while I had to land for a comfort break, so we packed up and headed home.
Thursday, 25th September 2008
The forecast promised that the cloud would burn off and it would be a sunny day. We expected it to be pretty much like yesterday only less windy. We worked in the morning and then got a call from Graeme to let us know it was flyable on Corndon, despite still being very cloudy. Dave T. reported nice cumulus in Telford, so we headed up there and listened to the BBC radio forecast on the way. Definitely sunshine for England and Wales in the afternoon.
Geoff and I elected to launch from the saddle near the car park and fly up, rather than walking up to the top like the Daves did. I launched first and had to scratch very, very closely to the rocks to get up. At one point I thought I was going to go down, but I managed to top land very untidily in the end. Geoff managed a bottom to top as well. It was very up and down, so short flights were possible, but you had to keep top landing to have another go.
Eventually the sun came out and it got sinky, so we all waited with bated breath for the epic conditions to start. Ten minutes later it was cloudier than it had been. When we packed up at 4pm, the wind was light and it looked so dark you would think it was going to start to rain.
I’m starting to get itchy feet and want to get going. Roll on the sun, sea and San Miguel…
Wednesday, 24th September 2008
Judith 24 Sep 2008 | : Archery
It was cloudy and grey this morning so we did jobs. By lunchtime it was brightening up a little, so we went to do archery. It was our last shoot of the season and we were worse than ever. Hopefully the weather next summer will permit more practise. We certainly need it!
As we were shooting the sky started to look pretty good, but windy in places. Chairman Dave was at Bankside, but he wasn’t flying when we called and we decided to continue packing and sorting ready for three possible days of flying from tomorrow.
Monday, 22nd September 2008
Judith 22 Sep 2008 | : Boring stuff
Forecast was for wind and rain. In actual fact it was not very windy and not very rainy. We worked and packed, ready for the big off at the weekend.
Sunday, 21st September 2008
Another light wind forecast, with an easterly component. It seemed that it might be cloudier at the Malverns for longer, so we decided to stay local and chose Corndon. I was getting frustrated at arriving too late the last day or two, so we went early. On the way there we saw the first cumulus popping up and we were first on site. I decided to fly the Aspen II instead of the Zoom, as the sheep crap seems to have dried a bit over the last few days. As we were getting set up, Luke and Wayne arrived, followed by Kai. As we were getting ready a few birds were about, but it seemed like the day could improve. I need to work on my ground handling with the Aspen as it launches a lot faster than the Zoom (or, in fact, the Golden), so I started idly pulling the glider up. Kai shouted to me to show everyone where the lift was and I turned around, saw a buzzard thermalling up, launched and got straight to cloudbase. Very cool.
Geoff launched straight after me but didn’t get in the same core. He flew off to the east side and caught a good thermal and we caught up with each other on the other side of Corndon. We could see Wayne and Kai frantically trying to get in the air after us.
Geoff and I managed to stay together all the way to Long Mountain. The climbs were painfully slow and the best I got was 1.6m/s. We never got above 3000AMSL, but every wisp was working, so it was easy to drift along. At Long Mountain it was clear we would drift into Welshpool airspace, so we needed to crosswind to the north to stay out of it. Cloudbase wasn’t high enough to fly over it. Geoff went on a glide to a cloud which didn’t work and I followed him, hoping to pick up a thermal on Long Mountain. There was an obvious trigger, the gully leading up to the aerial, but it is completely covered in trees and with the height we had it would have been a huge gamble to fly into it hoping for lift. Once in it there was nowhere to land. Both of us chose the safe option and flew along side it, but we didn’t get any lift. We landed in the same field, for the first time ever (on an XC). It’s nice to fly together, and to land together is pretty special. We were right about the gully being a good trigger, after we landed successive groups of birds thermalled out from there.
Wayne kindly retrieved us and on getting back we saw Kai coming back from some massive triangle (as usual). A cold beer later, we’re still smiling. Oh, and I LOVE the Aspen!
Geoff’s comments: it was a short XC, but quite tricky. An inversion was capping the thermals at around 3000 or so ASL; the thermals were quite broken, hard to find a solid core. And because we were unable to break through the inversion, we couldn’t get enough height to go over the airspace, hence the decision to try and go round (rather than straight through it, which was, inevitably, where the good clouds were). A shame the cloud we went to didn’t work, because I think there was a lot of distance to be had in the day. We made a good decision after the failed cloud to go to Long Mountain, full of classic triggers (which worked after we landed). Going there, though, meant that we were heading into rising ground, whilst we were in sinking air, not a good combination, but in the circumstances a risk worth taking. Had we been, say, 500 feet higher when we got to Long Mountain, I think we would have gone over the gully and got up again (or found a thermal on some other trigger there).
We could have tried for a triangle or out and return, but on my 1/2 that’s not really a good bet, so, for once, I’m quite happy with the decision we made, even if it did put us down on the ground. That’s what happens when you have to avoid airspace.
All in all, a good flight, made even better by us launching, flying and landing together.