Another slow start whilst waiting for the canopies to dry out with the initial high humidity at North Hill and some orographic cloud blowing up the gulley. But patience was rewarded and the first flight was just before 12:00.
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| Mike Horwood with Peter Smith for Card checks (David Clements) |
Surface wind was a quite light southwesterly but there was clearly a good wind gradient with high winch launches all day.
1600ft launches were the norm with 10-12 minute circuits, Training, check flights and solos all enjoyed the good winter conditions and tuggie Mark Courtney was also in demand. Stu Procter came along and enjoyed his first tows with the Pawnee since his enforced break from towing.
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| Ron Johns and Chris Wool in Perkoz (David Clements) |
Late in the afternoon, thickening patchy cloud started making it feel quite dark. Peter Smith had the last flight of the day and got an exceptional 1900ft on the winch, but Ktrax log thought that Peter landed in the middle of the flight.....
"I
found the small wave lift area west of Broadhembury and pulled the speed
back and sat in it for a few minutes maintaining height and little
visible ground speed. My suggestion is that I was actually geo-stationary without change in altitude for long enough for KTrax Log to
conclude that I had landed. Thus when I resumed forward motion it
recorded it as a separate flight from the Broadhembury “virtual landing
strip”. Hence the missing minute or so.
The
winch launch was the highest I have ever had, and I omitted to tell the winch driver, that it was a perfect launch, a constant 65
knots and smooth but very steep, I suspect because of ridge or wave
lift. It just went on for much longer than normal, pure luck. Right
place right time. I read it as 1900ft but KTrax Log says 2030ft."
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| Junior landing (David Clements) |
Thanks to all for a pleasant day, and especially winch drivers Ian Hunt and Aston Key for the great winch launches today, and Instructors Pete Harmer, Peter Smith and Chris Wool for driving the two-seaters. 19 winch launches and 5 aerotows -J&P
