The mist was thick at North Hill and all the way to Okehampton. By mid-morning a bar of light was breaking through parallel to the western flank of Dartmoor. Around lunchtime James turned up having just rolled out of bed.
Don (The CFI at Brentor) and a willing band of helpers started to DI and rig gliders. The B4 was online and John was persuaded to take the first launch, unfortunately unsucessful. James and Henry jumped into a K7/13 to show him how it should be done.
After being thrown around at the top of the wire in rough wave rotor for a few minutes, the air suddenly went smooth and the vario literally hit the stop!!
TEN-UP...
Pointing at the altimeter "We're at 2,500 ft" ... nope "3,500 ft", The lift was strong all the way to 5000 ft QFE (8.2 knots average on the trace).
At around 7500 ft QFE the climb levelled out and the K13 saw a high point of 8100 ft. An epic descent followed with full airbrakes being ineffective against the lift, in places still doing two knots up!
The circuits started at around 1500-2000 ft and final turns were well over 600 ft. Approach speeds of 65-75 knots were required until the last 50 ft when everything smoothed out.
Brentor is a great site for wave off Dartmoor in Easterlies, slightly North of East is preferable.
North Hill pilots, get to Brentor more often! It's only an hour away from Exeter.
They have a blog similar to ours.
