Friday 24th July 2026
Posted: 25/07/2026 15:00
Friday 24th. An essentially blue day, but with wave clouds visible over the Pennines, led to some high wave climbs and wave XCs from the day's 23 ATs and 3 self launches off runway 24. 5 flights climbed to between 5k & 10k' asl, 3 between 10k and15k asl and 2 over 15k asl. One of the highest fliers was Martyn Johnson in his DG600, who, after spending 1.5 hrs locally below 3,000' asl in hill lift and thermal, eventually contacted the wave in the Thirsk/Topcliffe area, climbing to 9,000' asl just to the SW of RAF Topcliffe before proceeding to Ripon and then climbing to 19,300' asl over Staveley before returning to Sutton. Martyn's peak altitude of 19,300; asl was matched by Clive Swain in his Kestrel 10 who spent 2.75 soaring locally before, like Martyn, contacting the wave in the Topcliffe area with a climb to 6,000' asl. Moving steadily westwards in a series of increasing climbs over Ripon and the Kirkby Stephen area Clive few back to the Vale of York and climbed to his peak altitude over Masham before returning to site and indulging in a spell of hill soaring, eventually landing after a flight of 7:12 having covered 288 OLC km. The other three pilots to climb above 10k' asl, had quite different tales to tell. Andrew Wilmot contacted the wave straight of and climbed to his maximum altitude of 10,500' asl near Ripon before visiting Northallerton on his way back to site, while Ian Bullous in his DG808 also contacted just to the SW of site and climbed to 11,700' asl there before visiting the Tontine and Northallerton TPs. Peter Crawley's flight in his ASH31M included an early engine burn, followed by wave contact in the Boroughbridge/Ripon area followed by progressively higher climbs near Harrogate N and to his peak altitude of 11,300' asl near Pateley Bridge. Continuing on to Kirkby Stephen, Peter lost all his height and spent the return journey back to Sutton below 4,000' asl and the last 50 km of his 213 OlC km trip below 2,500'asl. Dean Crosby in his LS10t, after contacting the wave just W of Topcliffe, flew west into the Lake District, overflying Kendal and Ullswater, climbing to 9,800' asl and returning via Kirkby Stephen having flown 265 OLC km, while Steve Thompson in his Ventus bt, discounting a wave day, set off on a thermal base task to the E of site but had to resort to his engine near Malton. Returning to site, Steve recognised the few raggy clouds as rotor and contacted the wave to the NW of Sutton, flying from there to as far W as the Brough area, covering 275 OLC km and climbing to 9,700' asl. The other > 5,000' asl pilots were Steve Ogden in his Discus, who took a while to contact the wave, but then climbed to 8,600' asl just to the SW of site before doing a rapid O/R to Ripon, and Maxwell Miller who climbed to 9,500' asl just to the E of Ripon in the Discus having contacted the wave off tow and Ian McFarlane who took one of the day's 7 First Flight pupils to 5,300' asl in K21 KLW during their 33 minute flight.
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