Tuesday 30th August to Thursday 1st September 2022
Posted: 01/09/2022 21:47
Tuesday 30th. The continuing flow from the NNE brought in overcast skies and although cloud base was high enough to allow flying, the cloud was thick enough to prevent any significant convection and also to produce some light drizzle at times. In spite of this, the day's launch total reached 30, mainly due to the visitors for Slingsby Week, their colourful gliders of yesteryear, brightening up a somewhat grey sky although the activities of the Tuesday evening group also lent a hand. The lack of lift meant the day was of the up, round and down variety with only 2 flights lasting more than 30 minutes, with Duncan Pask's 1 hour in his LS10t owing something to the t. Guy Hartland and Osian Petts' 32 minutes was the other flight over 30 minutes, all the more memorable as it was off an 1700' tow. The day's 5 First Flight pupils, while not experiencing any lift, no doubt enjoyed the excellent visibility and quiescent conditions.
Wednesday 31st. The high pressure to the north of the UK remained in place so another day of winds from the NE quadrant resulted, albeit somewhat stronger than on Tuesday, with ATs off runway 06 although landings were on either 06 or 02. Cloudy skies to start soon broke up to sunny intervals with the sun able to generate convective lift that resulted in 11 of the day's 23 flights exceeding an hour, with 3 exceeding an hour. Two of the latter were by visitors Chris Rosser and Ryan Hobson both flying Olympia 463s, with Chris having 2;56 and Ryan 1:36. Chris also climbed to just under 5,000' asl, YGC member Andrew Wilmot was the other >1 hour pilot with 2:40 in his ASW20 and also climbing to the next best height of the day, 4,700' asl. 3 other flights climbed oto 4,000' or more, Ian Pattingdale/Ivan Maczka, 4,200', Laurie Clarke/Neil Amos, 4,100' and Ian Pattingdale with another of the day's First Flight pupils, 4,000' all asl. John Carter, with the first of the day's 4 First Flight pupils in K21 JVZ, had set the ball rolling with 31 minutes off the first flight of the day. YGC's Falke did a navigation/cross country excercise with TPs at Tadcaster, Wetherby and Disforth while a Falke from the London Gliding Club at Dunstable stopped en route to Currock Hill the home of the Northumbrian GC.
Thursday 1st September. The change of month and the official start of autumn did little to change the weather, the ENE'ly flow starting the day but progressively veering into the E, while remaining light to moderate. Take offs were again off runway 02 with landings on either 02 or 06 as attractive looking streets formed, these looking more promising than they turned out to be. The day's 35 launches again owed much to the visitors for Slingsby week, who contributed 14 of them, with their contribution to the 7 flights of over an hour being 6, including the 4:06 by Justin Wills in his Schleicher Rhonbussard which first flew in the 1930's, while the longest 2 seater flight of the day was the hour flown by visitors Ken Reid/Russel Hardcastle in their very smart Slingsby T21. The day's 8 flights of over 30 minutes but less than 60 minutes were, on the other hand, populated mainly by YGC pilots, with the best of them the 54 minutes by Rod Brister in Astir DPO. The next longest flight of over an hour was by YGC member Paul Whitehead in his Ventus 2cxt who had 3:34. Setting off on a 250 km task with a first TP at Snainton, Paul found the attractive looking streets to be not attractive at all and had to resort to his engine at Pickering, having descended to 1400' asl. Having returned to Sutton by engine power, Paul found another thermal and set off again, but in a repeat of his previous attempt, had to resort to his engine again over the same field near Pickering, having this time descended to 1300' asl. Again returning to Sutton, Paul found a thermal that took him, via a cloud climb, to 6,100' asl. This was not, however, the best climb of the day as later, Clive Swain in his Kestrel 19 climbed to 6,600' asl as he soared locally, with the best of other climbs being in the 4,200 -4,500' asl range, the cloud base for the day. The Dunstable Falke, which had landed at Sutton on Wednesday enroute to Currock Hill returned to Sutton before setting off for Dunstable.
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.