Tuesday 2nd to Wednesday 3rd May 2023
Posted: 05/05/2023 16:19
Tuesday 2nd. A light to moderate SSE'ly blew all day, bringing overcast skies that ruled out convection, although cloud base slowly rose from around 2,000' to around 5,000' asl. In spite of a lack of soaring opportunities, and helped by the Tuesday evening group's contribution, the day's launch total off runway 20 was 27, although no one managed to exceed 30 minutes. The longest flight was by Steve Thompson/Pete Therwall in K21 KLW, their 24 minutes owing much to their 3,400' tow, while the only other flight to exceed 20 minutes was by Julian Gerretsen who flew KLW solo for 22 minutes off a 2,500' tow.
Wednesday 2rd. The wind, light to moderate in strength, slowly backed from SSE to ESE over the flying day, with Cumulus forming under milky high cover, this producing 8 flights of over 30 minutes with 4 over an hour. Guy Hartland/Roger Taylor in K21 JVZ had the first soaring flight of the day, 36 minutes, using some weak thermal, while two of the >an hour flights were by 2 of the 3 private owners to fly, with Clive Swain having the other 2, the first with Tony Kirby in K21 KLW lasting exactly an hour and the second with Neil Amos in K21 JVZ at 1:03. Local cloud base started off around 2,400' asl improving slowly to around 3,700' asl and the thermals were generally weak, average climb rates being around 1kt, with Bruce Grain/ visitor Eileen Scothern in KLW having a 41 minute flight and Guy Hartland/Steve Scothern in JVZ having a 45 minute flight. Jim McLean/Polly Whitehead in JVZ completed the day's soaring list with 36 minutes off the last flight of the day. The two private owners to have >an hour flights did so via cross country ventures. Steve Thompson in his Ventus A/B flew 209 km with TPs at Carlton Moor/ Kexby/Wetherby and Aysgarth, describing the conditions as low and slow to start and fading at the end of his 3:51 flight. Steve's overall average climb rate was1,7 kts, with his best 3.1 kts, his best altitude of 4,500' asl coming not long after a low point of 1,400' asl near Sutton on Forest. Bob Calvert in his Discus 2 was the other XC pilot covering around 165 km as he visited areas around Pocklington, Wetherby, Harrogate North, Castle Howard and the northern edge of York in his flight of 4:37. Bob's best altitude was 4,100' asl and while having similar overall average climb rates to Steve, did find an average climb of 3.8 kts.
This blog describes a snippet of life at the Yorkshire Gliding Club. Why not take a flight and try it yourself, or we can teach you to fly as a full club member.