Dartmoor Gliding News-Saturday 27th August 2016

After yesterday's sunny, thermic conditions today stared as a bit of a disappointment with heavy cloud cover and the wind forecast to be mostly southerly. Despite this, the airfield was going to be busy. The surprise was that the wind was actually easterly.

The sky was shouting wave
Regular readers will know that an easterly wind can bring us good wave flying conditions and is guaranteed to raise the pilots expectations. Right from the first flight there was signs of wave with nearly all flights sustaining for 10 to 12 minutes or so in weak wave conditions which allowed the aircraft to maintain height for short periods. There was signs of rotors particularly on the final turn and approach but thankfully this was also weak. Longest flight of the day was only 18 minutes.

Towards the end of the afternoon the wind suddenly veered to the south which seem to trigger new wave conditions laying east-west instead of the north south wave bars that the easterly wind produces. We have no idea what the trigger for this wave was. South Coast maybe?.

One Day Course Candidate Tom Bevan with IFP Rick Wiles
The Pike Family
We welcomed several visitors today with Tom Bevan on a One Day Course and Freda Welton, Brendon O'Keefe, Freddie Kelly and Lisa Pike attending for Introductory Flights. Our visitors were flown by a combination of Rick Wiles, Ged Nevisky and myself ( Steve Lewis ) using K13 G-CHXP while Gordon Dennis continued the club training effort in K13 G-DDMX.

Brendan O'Keefe waiting for a launch
Freddie Kelly gets a pre flight briefing from Steve Raine
Freda Welton with rick just before her first flight
Thanks today to all those who helped make the day go as smoothly as possible.

Steve

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