Saturday 26th September 2026
Posted: 27/09/2026 12:20
Saturday 26th. A moderate/moderate to fresh SW'ly blew all day as a sunny morning turned into a cloudier afternoon, hill, thermal and wave lift providing a interesting soaring day. The day's 22 ATs, 3 winch launches and a self launch off runway 24 generated 23 flights of over 30 minutes with 18 of these over an hour, as 18 private owners launched and 5 First Flight pupils were flown. It wasn't an entirely straightforward day, with Toby Wilson in his Standard Cirrus landing out at nearby Bagby airfield, Peter Crawley in his ASH 31M having to use his engine twice during his 3:06 flight that included a wave climb to 9,600' asl over Masham and a trip to near Hawes, while Steve Thompson, after a wave climb to 5,000' asl off tow, attempted a 241 km thermal/hill task with TPs at Tontine, Burn. Thirsk and Wetherby but covered 142 km, returning to site after turning Burn due to spreadout. Steve and Peter were 2 of the 6 pilots who had wave climbs, the others being Fred Brown in his Ventus 2ct with 11,700' asl near Leyburn during his 4:36, 203 OLC km flight, Neil Paveley in his Nimbus 2 with 10,400' asl near Northalleron, followed by a 149 OLC km journey via Barnard Castle and Ripon, Graham Morris in his Ventus 2cxt, 6,700' asl locally, Andy and Katharine Balkwill 6,400' asl also locally in their Janus C, and Chris Teagle in his LS8t-18, whose climb to 9,300' asl over Cowesby followed a scratchy low start on the main W'ly ridge and was followed by visits to Barnard Castle, Pateley Bridge and Wetherby to cover 213 OLC km and a higher climb to 9,800' asl near Richmond. The other > an hour pilots all stayed local using a combination of hill but mainly thermal lift with cloud base rising to around 4,500' asl and average peak thermal strengths of 3 kts. There were no > an hour flights in club gliders, but Clive Swain/Findlay Rawson were closest with 48 minutes of local soaring in K21 KLW.
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.