Tuesday 30 April - Course week

Another bright fresh morning but today was a north easterly wind a little stronger than forecast. Nearly all the course members needed some launch failure practice and we got this out of the way first thing. From then on course flights were all soaring flights.
Congratulations to Paul M on his first solo flight including soaring for half an hour.

Paul with a cheesy grin after his first solo soar

Mark W and Ray B both resoloed after the winter weather. Jon (an early solo pilot from Kestrel club) flew his first solo at North Hill.
Paul C flew his Ventus locally for a 2.5 hours.
Joe S in ASW19 877 achieved his 2 hour soaring flight towards his cross-country endorsement, and Ron with John P in ASH25 711 went to deepest Cornwall, and nearly got stuck behind Dartmoor  having turned Launceston and Truro, but made it back rounding Chard for 310kms.
A selection of photos from Cornwall.

Launceston Castle

Eden Project

Truro Cathedral

Falmouth

Fowey

Monday 29th April - Course week

The first course of this season dawned bright if not a little cold, but the sun was out, and the Cu was popping. It was soarable from the word go and the thermals got stronger and stronger and the patches of sink got larger and larger.
All members of the course enjoyed soaring flights and circuits or cable break practice. Spare cables were used by Pete St Discus 230 who went round the Club 100 twice, Tom in DG100 DG1 flying locally and congratulations to Adrian in Jantar FDX for 5 hours which completes his Silver Badge.

Sunday 28th April

Sunday's forecast from earlier in the week was rather promising, but as the days passed, it became clear that it would be a let down for cross-country flying.  But it wasn't a complete write-off as there were 40 winch launches, 5 aerotows and several flights getting into wave to 2500ft.
Simon M Regional Examiner put John P through his paces and renewed his Instructor's rating.  Welcome back to John who will fill a useful slot on the Instructor roster.
Congratulations to Heather for converting to K6 DQS.

Heather learns to love wood

Saturday 27th April

A very busy day instructing today in cold blustery North East winds.

Chris and Ruth trying to keep warm

In the morning all three 2-seaters were kept busy with Mike Fitz, Stuart and myself, in the afternoon the 2 K21's were still busy training and the DG 505 was active with Mark C and Paul S preparing for his Ass Cat course. 

I flew with a new temporary member Paul D this morning who is very keen and I am sure will join soon, I also enjoyed a nice soaring flight with Ray R this afternoon, Phil M tried to catch us but this time we won! - LH

Friday 26th April

The second of our ad-hoc flying days this year with 7 members enjoying flights in their private gliders.
 Pete St in Discus 230 was the star of the day completing a 304 kms flight in testing conditions. North Hill - Dorchester - Dulverton - Melbury Bubb - Tiverton - North Hill

 Possibly my slowest 300 ever.
But here's the thing. When you fly from Devon(look at the geography), then factor in the 20kts+ NNW wind and the fact that you can only task E-W.
And there's more - having to cross the dreaded Somerset Levels 4 times. I feel I earned every one of these points today - in fact I reckon I've been done! On the final crossing of the Levels I had to run down to the S coast to avoid the sea air that had penetrated all the way South from Bridgwater bay in the North.
Of course these are just excuses for my own incompetence and thoughts are really with friends not so lucky today.


Wyn  in LS7 W7 completed 109kms exploring local turnpoints  and Ron and Phil in Ash25 711 completed 178kms Dorchester - Dulverton.

Thursday 25th April

Low cloud and drizzle to start and having had several rope breaks recently, the Thursday thermallers set about renewing both winch ropes ready for the spectacular soaring season to come.

Renewing the ropes in the fog

 The winch got a bit lost in the fog at the far end of the airfield, but as forecast a clearance came through after a late lunch and the first launch was at 1515. The ridge worked intermittently with the odd thermal, but flights were limited to about 20 minutes. Everyone flew and we packed up at 19:00.

Wednesday 24th April

An overcast day on Wednesday with no flying until after an early lunch. Initial launches went into cloud but the cloud base slowly went up to an awesome 1400 ft!  5 or 6 mins was average as the wind was slight and any thermals were tiny and fierce and seemed to bear no relation to clouds or ground trigger points.
The most exciting things were watching cable breaks, or possibly having one. It's the only time we are allowed to skim the tree tops in  a tight bank and not be told off!  Actually a couple of the cable breaks were the real deal and you could almost hear the instructors apologising with "it wasn't me that time!"

There was a good number of people out today;  all cheerful, helpful and keen despite the rather average conditions. It was nice to be warm.

Today the swallows and JSt took to the skies above North Hill again, the swallows returned after 6 months away and JSt after an enforced break of 6 weeks.

John Sil, stood in for Ernie who had business commitments, Pete F flew in with the Cub for a brief visit.

Last of the summer Pale Ale

As usual we were not short of advice from onlookers and were pleased to welcome Compo, Cleggy and the Corporal sign writer who were made comfortable on piles of tyres. They later found an old bath and rode it down the hillside to Broadhembury where the mischievous one on the right went off looking for Norah Batty. - Tim J & JSt

Sunday 21st April

A bit of a slow start, under lowish soggy cloudbase, but eventually training flights got going. CFI Pete was checked out by Regional Examiner Simon M on a 3 year standardisation check and managed to find a short gap out of reach of the winch launch. Circuits continued until the drizzel became too heavy.

Saturday 20th April

After our record 11 flights on the ladder yesterday, we can't compete with ~100 flights on the ladder today as the weather in the rest of the country was not replicated in Devon.
There was very little wind to start with ......

Mike demonstrates the use of a calibrated handkerchief

and RASP didn't promise much, but it was thermic in the morning. However the seaair marched through at around 14:00-15:00, with the sky going blue, but later it did get going again with some very small tight climbs to 3,100 ft were possible if you could stay high.
Andrew L K6 GDE and Tim J ASW19 877 managed just over an hour and Henry Cirrus OR and Martin LS3 KMV for hour and half.
But otherwise there were a large number of short flights - 72 winch launches. Paul L renewed his acquaintance with SF27.

Friday 19th April

Matt put out a call for "epicness" for Friday earlier in the week, and a total of 13 gliders lined up for aerotows on our first "ad-hoc flying day" this year - a new concept to open the Club on good soaring days. The strong north westerly wind was forecast to ease, but it actually stayed at about 13 knots at flying heights throughout the day. Cloudbases to the east were 5000 ft but at Molton was down to 2500 ft. The sky was continually changing with streets forming and thermal strengths up to 8 knots average but similar amounts of sink.

Ron and Phil  in ASH25 (711) were the first to launch just before 1200, Ron had wanted to circumnavigate Dartmoor for a long time and thought that today (although not perfect) might provide the right conditions. They completed NHL - Okehampton - Ivybridge - Dorchester- NHL, dawdling a little over Exmouth and the Exe estuary whilst Phil was surveying his house and boat from the air. 263 km.

Dartmoor Prison

Burrator Reservoir

Looking for Phil's boat

 Matt  in ASW20 (M5) and JB in Ventus set off to Dorchester and turned South Molton and Cerne Abbas for 320 km, Matt tried to convince everyone that there was a convergence on the south coast, but ended up with a very low save on a ridge near Chard disturbing two buzzards in the hedge who showed him where the thermal was.

M5 arriving back - beautiful sky still!

Pete St, Discus (230), completed Dorchester - South Molton 210 km but didn't fancy any more head wind.

James flew DG505 (JZK) solo and completed Dorchester - Tiverton 158 km and this is the first cross-country that James has got back home claiming his 100km Diploma.

Congratulations to Paul  S who flew Cirrus 477 and completed an out and return to Dorset Club at Eyres Field for 150 km and had to work hard driving the empty Cirrus back into wind but achieved Silver Distance and 100 km Diploma.

Well done Paul

Congratulations to Adrian P who flew Std Jantar FDX landing near Cerne Abbas after turning Dorchester 81 km for Silver Distance and first field landing.

Well done Adrian

 Tom in DG100 (DG1), fresh from completing his Silver distance two weeks ago, attempted another 100 km flight but landed near Beaminster for his first field landing.

Roly in Kestrel (523) completed the Club 100 Tiverton - Yeovil to claim his 100 km diploma (strangely after his 300 km).

Pete and Jill in Duo Discus (OL) (taking off two hours after Ron) decided to go upwind first turning South Molton and Dorchester, and completed their fastest cross-country for a long while 219kms at 88.8 km/h.

Meanwhile Eric LS7 (194) , Jeff T with Mosquito (380) first outing for a year, Peter Sm Lak19 (1UP) running multiple engine checks all stayed local.

A great day out and lots of achievements- thanks to all our helpers Mark C for tugging, Dave C and Malcolm V for wing running and retrieves. - Here's to the next "Ad-Hoc day".

Logger traces of a Jolly Fine Wheeze