May 2009
Monthly Archive
Sunday, 31st May 2009
Geoff writes: well, we almost got it right today, two out of three – right site, managed to get up and away – just didn’t get that second thermal.
We set the alarm this morning, to wake up early and make a decision about where to go. A couple of hours later, we finally managed to decide between the Malverns, Penycloddiau, Pandy, Moel Berfedd, and Corndon. No wonder it takes so long to decide where to go…
In the end, having spent hours gazing at synoptic charts, looking at web sites, listening to the BBC weather, and phoning people around the country, we decided on Corndon, just down the road. It’s a great XC site, but not the easiest site there is.
We turned up relatively early, for us, at around 11am. Some people were trying to fly, doing short hops, but not getting any great height; so we set up, and chatted a bit to various people who had decided to relocate from the Malverns to Corndon, hoping it would be less windy here, and a better direction.
Eventually, about 12.15, I launched. No-one was in the air then, but I started to climb, and was quickly followed by Kirsty Cameron, Chris and Judith. The climb was quite good, and the drift was relatively fast, and I was quickly committed to going over the back. Judith climbed up to me, and left with me, Kirsty and Chris went back to the front; as we were climbing out, I saw them back at ridge height, and was thinking maybe they’d made a mistake – just shows how wrong you can be! Judith and I drifted slowly back, getting at max 800′ ATO, which we finally lost. Went on a glide to the Harry Tuffin’s supermarket, which should have been kicking off a thermal, but didn’t. We landed in adjacent fields. After we landed, we saw Kirsty, who had climbed out again and this time gone over the back. She was heading to the exact spot over Tuffin’s where we had gone, but she found our thermal, and carried on, for about 18k. We weren’t jealous at all!
As we were walking back to the road, we saw another gaggle of five gliders: Wayne, Martin Knight, Chris, Steve Newcomb and Pete Cook. They were circling in zeros, working well together, and gradually drifted off into the distance… we managed to blag a ride back up to launch from Michaela, expecting to fly again, but it was strong as we arrived, and just got stronger – though the sky was getting far better. Malcolm and Steve Pym did launch, and did get away – probably for a long way, given the really nicely spaced cumulus, and the good drift. And we never did fly again – the wind just picked up too much!
Wayne did around 20k, Chris did 45k (excellent), Martin around 30k, Steve about 18, landing near Kirsty. Not sure about anyone else.
Oh well, at least we got away, and we did make a good site decision (though laziness, not wanting to drive long distances, might have had some influence on that!). So, not a disaster, but we could have done far better. What was our mistake? There’s always a mistake somewhere, if you land when the day is still cooking. Maybe we left slightly too early, but we were getting up in a reasonable thermal, and, for me at least, I was probably too far back anyway to get back to the front. But also, we were anxious to leave as soon as we could because the forecast was for the wind to get stronger, so it seemed to be a good idea to go when we did – and, leaving early, is often a good decision. The thermal we climbed out in did get broken up, but we drifted with it a bit, but then lost it and went to look for another, and that was probably the key mistake – we lost the thermal, rather than it petering out completely, and we should have made more of an effort to stay in it, or relocate it when we lost it.
Anyway, many congratulations to all the other pilots who did go further than us (actually, that’s everyone who went XC from Corndon today)!
Note added Monday morning: when we drove home last night we could see police cars, ambulances and what looked like a crashed sailplane on the Mynd – clearly there had been an accident. Unfortunately, we discovered this morning that the worst has happened, and that there was a fatality. Our sincere condolences go to the pilot’s family and to all his colleagues at the Midland Gliding Club.
Saturday, 30th May 2009
Judith 30 May 2009 | : Boring stuff
A glorious day, shame it was so windy. There was little wind here first thing, and we considered going to the Malverns, but within 15 minutes it had started howling. We spent a mega relaxing day gardening.
Friday, 29th May 2009
The forecast was good, until they increased the predicted wind strength. So, where to go? It was a toss up between Corndon, Bache or the Malverns. We opted for Corndon, as it would give us the flexibility of a direction change and we didn’t think it would be too wind affected.
Geoff, Simon and I headed up there and we met Andy, Helen, Simon, Nigel, John, Mike and Duncan at the second gate. A DSC reunion! It was howling, but we decided to go up and have a look and it was flyable, although a little top-end. Mike J. did the wind dummy honours and despite lots of wind and fantastic looking clouds there was very little lift. He stuggled to get higher than a few hundred feet for a while but climbed out with John S. after he launched. Cloudbase was very low and they seemed to have to go over the back with little height.
Helen, Andy, Nigel and Simon then launched, but they had to fly around in what looked very rough, sinky/lifty conditions for an hour before Helen got away. The rest of us watched and I decided that it didn’t look any fun at all being in the air, so my glider stayed firmly in the bag. We had reports of people flying at the Malverns and at the Gyrn, but Malverns was too far to get there in time, so we headed for the Gryn instead. On the way we saw Helen on the edge of Long Mountain, and we were willing her to get another thermal.
On getting to the Gyrn it seemed breezy in the landing field, but ok on top. Malcolm and Steve D. launched and got high, but the wind was gusty and it was 4pm, so I took it easy and chatted for a while. The wind seemed to be increasing on take off, but Nick Bubb launched and went straight up to 900 feet without turning. I launched next, and it took me a couple of minutes to fly forwards. I assumed I was ok flying the Zoom (size S) with 5kg of ballast, which put me way above its weight range, but I had trouble pushing forwards a couple of times.
The air was also lumpy. Not dangerous, but your glider would twitch in unexpected directions for no apparent reason. I flew out from the ridge for 1km and got lift all the way. There was no cloud above me and no wave apparent. I wasn’t sure I really liked it and it was picking up on launch, so I headed for the bottom. Because of the strengthening wind on take off and my lack of forward penetration Geoff decided not to bother flying.
Shame we didn’t go to the Malverns. Someone flew 130km from there. Amazing given how low cloudbase was!
Thursday, 28th May 2009
Having looked at several forecasts, it wasn’t obvious when the cloud would clear and if it would be too windy or not. One person had posted on the Beyond Extreme forum asking if anyone else was going flying today, so we thought not too many people would be out. Boy were we wrong. A HG and five PGs were already flying by 10am.
The BBC was spot on in that they predicted it would be cloudy until 4pm and it was. Geoff had an early flight, but it was picking up and I had forgotten my ballast, so popped home to get it. I flew but landed untidily in strong winds and broke a line (long, very boring story), so had to pop home again for the spare glider. Equipment issues were getting to be a bit of a theme today. By the time I got the Zoom clipped in and set up, the sky was nearly blue and the conditions were like those transitions periods you get when it gets sinky before the thermals establish themselves again.
Geoff and I launched and flew off to the right where people seemed to be getting up. It was hard going. Best climbs were between 0.8 – 1.2 m/s. At one point I got to 1030′ ATO and that was pretty high. The only person above me was Simon Gant, who was flying his Mac Envy really, really well. Cloudbase was only a few hundred feet higher and at one point I thought ‘stuff this… crap climbs, low cloudbase, might as well land and enjoy the sunshine.’ However, the climbs were plentiful and it was fun bobbing about with Simon, Geoff, Dennis and Nigel, although getting any higher than 1000′ was very hard work. Eventually at about 5pm, I managed to top up my height to get to base and then thought I might as well go. You have to be in it to win it!
I flew along the cloud in not too much sink and learnt that what they say about the back of the Mynd low down is true. The wind does blow down. I only just managed to scrape half way up the ridge on Ragleth and soared it for one beat, convinced I was down. Then I saw two buzzards and climbed just above ridge height and then I managed to get a thermal that took me back to about 950′ ATO. Pleased as cheese, I carried on and got another very weak climb, which took me to Rushbury, near Wenlock Edge, where I went down at 10km. A couple of lovely young lads came to see if I was ok and helped me pack up and then pointed me to the nearest pub, where Geoff came to get me.
It may not seem like a long way, but it was really satisfying to get away, especially so late. And like one day last year, the only two people to get away at all from the Mynd were two women, Helen and myself. Away the lasses!
Wednesday, 27th May 2009
Judith 28 May 2009 | : Boring stuff
The forecast was terrible for today, but the rain held off for most of the day. Getting the book completely finished took a lot longer than I expected, but at 7.30pm International Perspectives on Educational Interpreting was with the printers and I am now waiting for the approval copy.
Simon has come up from Brighton to fly here for a few days. We’re actually quite hopeful that we will get a couple of days of XC weather.
Tuesday, 26th May 2009
Judith 27 May 2009 | : Archery
Sunny but howling…
I have finished editing the book! Hoorah! Now I am working on the index and will do the final formatting in the morning, then it is off to the printers. By 4pm my eyes were nearly popping out of their sockets from staring at the screen all day, so we went to archery for a pleasant, if blustery shoot, and then to Tim and Raye’s for delicious dinner.
Monday, 25th May 2009
Judith 26 May 2009 | : Miscellaneous activities
Bank holiday monday, so inevitably bad weather…
It was grey and overcast when we got up but it was warm enough to sit in the garden for breakfast. On looking at the forecast it was clear it wouldn’t be much of a flying day, so Dave and I talked treehouses, conservatories and hedges. He’s taken a real liking to our hedge which is made up of several different plants and he was itching to cut it. It takes me ages, so I was happy to say yes. We all spent the day in the garden until the rain set in and Dave made his way back up north.