The day started with low cloud and fog covering North Hill, but with the promise of improving conditions by late morning. A small but dedicated (read very optimistic) band of members were up early prepping the kit for the forecasted improvement. Then followed a few hours of waiting occupied by all the usual discussions about flying, weather and several house-keeping tasks. James Flory spent a happy(ish) hour cleaning off all the airfield warnings signs and fire extinguisher points, which in places had began to evolve their own ecosystems, whilst Karen King did a sterling job hoovering out gliders until the hoover decided it had had enough excitement for one day and stopped working; it was later brought back to life with some gentle coaxing.
By now John Pursey, Matt Williamson, and Tim Peters had turned up and together with Paul Kane spent a happy(ish) few hours in the ground hanger stripping down the paint work on the nose of their glider SF27 Sophie.
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| Undignified pose for Sophie! (John Pursey) |
Ruth then arrived ready to get her ASW19 into the workshop ready for its’ annual. One of new temporary members Sam Smith was also trained on a few of the ground tasks including driving and vehicle DIing ready to get his ground ops card signed off.
By now the Duty Instructor Rowan Smith had assessed things as improving enough to get a K21 out. Whilst this was happening our CFI Stu and Simon Minson arrived and together with William Pope got Victor Golf out to do some currency flying following the wing recovering. Much debate then followed about whether it was worth setting up for flying, there now only being just enough members left to operate. But thanks to Karen’s motivating and Rowan’s willingness to give it a go the winch was driven out to the Southwest corner and Rowan took Sam on the first flight of the day by early afternoon. Victor Golf took to the sky shortly afterwards ready to do a sequence of take off and landings to get people back into currency. Thanks to Phil Grant who had offered to winch and retrieve single-handed which allowed Rowan to give Sam two further flights and to fly with Karen three times. James and Roly Clarke then shared two short but very enjoyable flights. The day was finished off by Phil and then Paul Summers enjoying solo flights in HCX. Not long flights but very enjoyable.
We were all done by about 16:00. Overall a short but enjoyable flying day; to quote Mike Sloggett (busy watching the Greens), if you don’t show you’ll never know! - James Flory
By now the Duty Instructor Rowan Smith had assessed things as improving enough to get a K21 out. Whilst this was happening our CFI Stu and Simon Minson arrived and together with William Pope got Victor Golf out to do some currency flying following the wing recovering. Much debate then followed about whether it was worth setting up for flying, there now only being just enough members left to operate. But thanks to Karen’s motivating and Rowan’s willingness to give it a go the winch was driven out to the Southwest corner and Rowan took Sam on the first flight of the day by early afternoon. Victor Golf took to the sky shortly afterwards ready to do a sequence of take off and landings to get people back into currency. Thanks to Phil Grant who had offered to winch and retrieve single-handed which allowed Rowan to give Sam two further flights and to fly with Karen three times. James and Roly Clarke then shared two short but very enjoyable flights. The day was finished off by Phil and then Paul Summers enjoying solo flights in HCX. Not long flights but very enjoyable.
We were all done by about 16:00. Overall a short but enjoyable flying day; to quote Mike Sloggett (busy watching the Greens), if you don’t show you’ll never know! - James Flory
