Thursday 30th July 2026.
Posted: 30/07/2026 21:15
Thursday 30th. A moderate W'ly blew all day following the overnight passage of a weak cold front that didn't bring any rain. The cooler air mass produced some good thermal conditions with a high cloud base of up to 6,500' asl and average peak climb rates around 5.5 kts, but apart from one flight, wave was a hindrance rather than a help. The exception was the flight by Maxwell Miller in the Discus. After an initial spell thermalling between site, Northallerton and Topcliffe, wave was contacted S of RAF Topcliffe with a climb to 10,100' asl followed by a trip to the other side of Ripon before returning to site having covered 104 OLC km. Several other pilots went wave hunting, including Dean Crosby in his LS10t, Martyn Johnson in his DG600 and Chris Teagle in his LS8-18t, but all had limited success. Dean abandoned a thermal based task due the the strong wind aloft and proceeded W to the Pateley Bridge area but finding no wave, returned to site and then flew the local 100 km Rufforth/Pocklington triangle at a handicapped speed of 99 kph, his total distance covered being 193 OLC km. Martyn flew an similar initial route to Dean and also returned to site after looking for wave in the Ripon/Pateley Bridge area. He then flew downwind to the East coast at Skinningrove before returning to site after covering 186 OLC km, while Chris did contact the wave just to the S of RAF Topcliffe climbing to 7,100' asl. His subsequent venture W to the Ripon area was equally unsuccessful in terms of wave contact and after returning to site Chris attempted the same 100 km triangle as Dean. After turning Pocklington, Chris abandoned the task S of York due to poor soaring conditions and returned to site having covered 155 OLC km. The day's 26 ATs off runway 24 led to 18 flights of over 30 minutes, with 9 of these over an hour, the launch total including 5 for private owners and 3 for First Flight pupils, while the Falke had a single flight. Apart from the flights described above, all the other soaring flights stayed local, with the longest flight in a club 2 seater being the 1:21 by Bob Beck/John Forrester in the DG1000.
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.