Friday 31st August

RASP had spotted a good soaring day from earlier in the week, with the promise of the first day of ridging from the Azores High (albeit with an incoming warm front during the afternoon). So the DSGC Google group had a call to action, and the North Hill soaring section turned out in force.

There was a 300km task set Whiddon Down - Salisbury, but after launching Rowan in Libelle CLM, the pundits decided to reverse the task going downwind first. Liam in KHA was next to launch attempting 5 hours locally. Phil and Ron ASH25 711  followed by Pete St Discus 230 and Peter Sm DG1 headed off to the east. Dylan LS7 W7 was also staying local. Jonathan ASW19 877 was going to attempt 100km out and return to Sherborne, but struggled to get away. Pete & Jill Duo Discus OL taking the last launch found that the local conditions had become quite difficult and took ages to regain launch height, but eventually headed off on the club 100. Phil & Ron and Pete St turned Salisbury and then found conditions difficult to the west of North Hill, aborting the task. Peter Sm turned Salisbury but got low and landed safely in a field near Crewkerne. Liam  managed to stay high until the effects of the warm front arriving caused him to land after about 4 hours.

Having stuck to the original task, by going west first, congratulations to Rowan for completing 300kms Gold Distance and Diamond Goal.

Rowan complete with cheesy grin

 Thanks to Robert for making a break in the patio laying to provide the aerotows.

Thursday 30th August

Another 'Wednesday washout' meant a busy Thursday for the club. There was a strong northerly crosswind creating a lot of turbulence below 700ft, so Pete, John Si and Chris were kept busy all day. Once through the excitement of the gusty launch, there were large areas of smooth lift in front of the ridge giving good soarable training flights. On a couple of occasions it was possible to transition into a low level gentle wave reaching 500ft above the cloudbase of 2500ft.

Sunday 26th August

The day promised much with a very favourable forecast on RASP, the North Hill Soaring section were rigging before 9am. The weather gods thought differently - with a lot of low cloud and spreadout until lunchtime.
Those who launched early, struggled after the first thermal, club flying continued apace with many Club members,Bank Holiday visitors, trial lessons and friends and family flights.

Queuing for aerotow

The sky eventually settled down into streets and Ron made a call that the sea breeze convergence at Honiton was working well.

Sea breeze front setting up at OtterySt Mary

Several gliders headed for the convergence and followed it to Yeovil area where it seemed to evaporate, providing some interesting glides back to North Hill.
Wyn LS7 W7 got onto the wrong side of the sea breeze as it marched quite quickly to the north, and landed safely in a nice looking but very soft and muddy grass field.
Ron and Phil ASH25 711, Simon M ASW20 SM,  followed the convergence (711 turned Henstridge), Pete St Discus 230  having got disheartened at Tiverton east and Pete & Jill Duo Discus OL enjoyed  their 3rd convergence day of the week.
Justin W Antares 1 visiting before returning home to New Zealand completed several cloud climbs and an out and return to Lasham.
Club flying continued until late, and in the evening there was a (belated birthday) party for Cheryl and Steph with a 70s theme.

Friday 24th August - Course week

After the best course week weather so far this year, Friday was wet. There was a lecture on circuit planning, and a presentation on the next steps in gliding for all the course members, followed by debrief and feedback from the whole week.

Thanks to JB and John for instructing and Nick, Les and William for running things on the ground.

Thursday 23rd August - Course week

Bright sunny morning soon clouded over, with a very light  breeze to start. Cloudbase just about allowed full height launches, and it was circuits all day for both Club and Course members.

Highlight of the day was when ex-Navy Pilot John  sent ex-Air Force Pilot Chris for his resolo in gliders after many years of flying at Her Majesty's expense.

John congratulates Chris (right)

In the evening, a group from Somerset Drainage Board flew trial lessons, and all the Course members, Helpers and Instructors and a lot of hangers-on had an enjoyable evening at the Keeper's Cottage.

Wednesday 22nd August - Course week

At last some good soaring weather! with the Wednesday club and the course - we had a very busy day, most pilots had over an hour in the fresh westerly wind.  The course continued their soaring, stalling, spinning, launch failure exercises,

Congratulations to Dylan on his 5hrs in the LS7 W7,- that makes the second Junior member to complete a silver leg this week.

Dylan with 45mins to go

 Jonathan, Tim & Joe made good use of the ASW19 877. Pete St in the Discus 230, Martin in LS3 KMV, Matt in ASW20 M5  Pete & Jill in the Duo OL all had good soaring flights running up and down the streets in the strong westerly wind. Matt also took some excursions to the Quantocks and his favourite South coast cliffs. Exeter Air Traffic were again very helpful today.

Matt starting his run out to sea at Exmouth

 It was nice to see all of the club gliders in use all day, in the evening another group from the Met Office enjoyed a trial lesson evening and barbeque organised by Henry.

Tuesday 21st August - Course week

Low cloud at first provided plenty of opportunities for launch failure training. Eventually full height launches were possible, but then showers provided time for some ground school.  At lunchtime, Liam gave a 'How I dunnit' to the SeeYou replay of his Silver Distance flight yesterday. It eventually got soarable at 6pm, and flying continued late into the evening, thanks to those who were willing to delay their dinner.

Monday 20th August - Course week

The sky looked good although the clouds were a little low to start with, it was difficult to get away from below 2000ft with all the recent moisture in the lowest layers. During the afternoon conditions improved although it was still tricky to get away from the winch.

The course had a good first day with everyone getting plenty of flying and continuing on into the evening.

Liam set off to The Park in the Junior, he landed in a large cut field near The Park which qualified for Silver Distance - Congratulations Liam.

Liam's field near The Park

Congrats to Andrew L who flew VG with Stu, getting signed up for Cross Country endorsement.

With a light west north westerly wind, a good looking sea breeze convergence started setting up from Exeter to Honiton. Pete St Discus 230 and Pete & Jill DuoDiscus OL investigated, talking to Exeter as 'glider formation' but the lift wasn't working very well and after 10 minutes Exeter asked us to move north to clear the approach. After some exploring towards Tiverton, the convergence reinvigorated and extended well to the East. OL and then Matt in 230 followed the energy to east of Merryfield. OL continued back across Exeter and then followed another convergence line up the motorway to Wellington. - A super day of convergences.

Sea breeze convergence over the Exe estuary

Thursday 16th August

After yesterday's wind and washout, it was a little better on Thursday - but still unflyable with a gusty southerly wind and low orographic cloud on the hill again. John Si gave a lecture on launching and circuits, then we rigged the K13 and rescued Liam's tent from a walkaround.
Dave C has now got his Bronze paperwork signed up.

Tuesday 14th August - Club week

Tuesday was a much better day, we started with pre-bronze pilots doing DIs under supervision, we were soon flying in the S to SW wind.

Dave C spent all morning completing his tasks for yellow card, well done Dave and well flown, Jonathan renewed his yellow card.

There were several soaring flights, everyone worked hard and we all had a super day helped by the weather and everybody's enthusiasm, but the highlight  was the last flight of the day with Heather and her P1 (ed: the one with the white hat) having an impromptu field landing, much to the amusement of all present.

Large crew helped, the little Diana towed the knackered K13 trailer down to the field. The entrance to the field was sodden so we had to derig and carry the bits into the next field.

I have never seen so many people around to welcome back an out-landed glider!   -  JSt