Day 9 Spring Task Week

Final day of the task week, Phil Sillet running the airfield, and after Tim's successful task setting yesterday he agreed to set todays. Weather was strong easterlies, blue with it looking much better in the west.

Tim set us multiple choice turnpoint task for mere mortals was TIB-HTN-THE-BSE-RAT-TIB, and for himself and the other pundits TIB-GRL-TIB.

In the end it turned out to be particularly difficult soaring conditions locally, with around 2knts to about 2oooft, and a 15knt north easterly wind. Pete Ryland had the best chance motoring inland to Honington before setting off on task to Olny. A few lucky pilots caught the duty thermal drifting towards HTN which did punch up through the inversion to about 2400ft on occasion, but no brave souls pushed out any further.

James flew his first flight in the Cirrus, also doing the longest flight of the day around 2hrs 45mins.

So thanks to all who participated, for those that flew XC please get your flights on the ladder - with or without traces - it all helps justify keeping our open airspace. www.bgaladder.co.uk

Well done to Pete Ryland winning the Spring Task Cup with a flight yesterday to Silverstone scoring the highest for the week. The Cup is presented at our annual dinner dance, and I understand Pete was the last winner some years ago, so he may be presenting it to himself - There was a suggestion we tape up his engine for the next task week to give the rest of us a chance!

Thank you to Ian, Don and Tim as weather and task setters, also Pete who was on standby for task setting and advising on ladder queries. And to Mick and the weekend duty teams for allowing us to hijack the briefing.

Proposed Summer Task Fornight from 25 July to 9th August.

Spring Task Week - Saturday

A good turn out of club members again, and Tim ran the day, including setting the tasks. Although the weather was not great - strong easterlies, at last we have some tasks attempted!! Pete Ryland winning the day with a trip to Sailverstone, returning to Honington before abandoning task. Paul Wilkinson did Newmarket and Bury St Edmunds before landing ar Rougham for an aerotow retrieve.

Flight of merit today was Dave Rusbridge in the club Astir turning Newmarket for a field landing somewhere near Brandon, thereby completing his first 50k for bonus points and completing his Silver for even more points!!

Spring Task Week - Friday

I was not around, however Mick ran the day and Don set some tasks. Only really soarable locally, however Will flew about 140k locally.

Spring Task Week - Wed & Thur

No tasks over Wednesday and Thursday due to poor weather. Mick ran the airfield and some local flights were made.

Day 4 Spring Task Week

Briefing at 10am today, with a presentation for Rachel and Eddy on their 25th wedding anniversary. The weather started very wet but with the clearance expected midday and soarable if windy conditions to follow, the task was set as East Dereham, Fakenham. Operation Snoopy was also put forward.

So after lunch, we took the K21 and tug out to the launch point on the church runway, and with wind blowing 15-20knts started operations. Mick flew with Paul T, Paul Woodcock and Mike Bean. Mark completed EDE PIK undeclared and Pete Ryland launched in the DG for Crowland and Snoopy, (so someone took the challenge - and Percy had a nice flight to Brandon and back!).

The weather certainly looked impressive and reported climbs of 4-5knts with cloudbase around 5000ft. However the wind was very strong - up to 20knts at surface, 28knts at height.

We had visitors from Wattisham who brought along the RAFGSA's Duo Discus XL and did some cross country flying towards Wattisham and back.

Day 3 Spring Task Week

Bank Holiday Monday, and a slower than usual start to preceedings. Briefing at 10am, the forecast was poor for the east, but there was a chance of some thermal activity. Ian set us a pilot assigned task ie. choose a variety of local turnpoints and turn up to 4.

In addition Operation Get Snoopy was launched. Percy Penguin currently resides behind the club bar, and Crowland have Snoopy. The challenge is to take off at Tib, land at Crowland and swap Percy for Snoopy.

Unfortunately the top cover didn't really clear well enough for the thermals to properly generate. Eventually flying off 08 (we changed ends a few times before getting started!), Will set up and drove the winch to start and I flew with Paul Thompson for a couple of winch training circuits, Tim H did some aeros in the K21 and a couple of trail lesson aerotows were also flown. Others also out included Mick, Mark, Jenny, Wilco, Ian, Mike Watson with Tony tugging.

So no scoring tasks today. With thunderstorms expected overnight everyone senisbly derigged. However there is a clearance expected midday tomorrow, so breifing at 10am with Don doing our weather and task setting.

Day 2 Spring Task Week

Blue with tops of climbs about 3000ft locally, however those that were brave and tasked saw 4000ft in places.

Mick and Ben H. flew the K21 on task to Honington return, however conditions were not good and so they locally soared. On returning they went to collect Jenny from a field towards Honington. Well done Jenny for going for it on a difficult day. Ben had his first taster of field retrieves, luckily this was a nice one in an easy place to find!

Adrian completed Honington return in his ASW19 and Steve FH completed the same task in his ASW20, both entering their first flight on the BGA ladder.

Paul Wilkinson and Mark declared larger tasks going out towards Cambridge and Rattlesden, Mark landing at Rattlesden, but Paul completing the task with one turn point missed.

Ian launched around 3:30 and did a quick out and return to Newmarket - proving the task was possible and doing his fastest task of the year at 72kph.

But flight of the day was Peter Ryland going to Northampton and a landout at Grafham Water.

Mention also for Harley who converted into the Astir. And Simon who flew for over 4 hours in his Mosquito (longest flight of the day).

42 launches and half a dozen flights of over 2 hours. A good day had by all.

Spring task week starts

...and we have good weather! It was great to see so many people turn up for an early start - Simon Ully and Jenny Novak both beating me to the hangar at 8:15 this morning!

Ian's forecast was for pretty good weather south of us, and so a multiple choice task was set. First turn point Rattlesden, then a variety across to Northampton West.

Quite a few declared 300k, Norman, Tim D, Ian, Bob, Dave T all setting out with big plans. With an easterly wind (completely different to forecast), cloudbase of about 2500ft, and the scent of the maltings wafting across the airfield, it started to go blue, and then top cover gradually killed the 2-3knt thermal activity around the airfield by about 3pm. Tim Davies getting the best of the day with completing TIB - RAT - DEP - TIB

Part of the task week is to encourage people to achieve something for themselves, however big or small, and so I should mention Simon Ully who flew his first flight in his new Mosquito, Dave Rusbridge who planned his silver distance (even though conditions meant the flight wasnt really on), and all those who rigged and flew where they would not have normally bothered.

Ray and myself were duty team, flying some trial lessons and a few check flights. JRK brought along family friends to fly, and I flew with a lady who had been bought the flight for her 80th birthday 6 months ago!

We filled up 2 pages of the logsheet, with flight times varying from a few minutes on check flights to over 2hours for the guys going XC.

So a good day, and a nice start to the week. Thanks to all who turned up, flew, helped out. See you at briefing tomorrow 9:30am.

Leading the Ladder

Some good soaring was available this weekend if you were prepared to work for it. Several ladder entries, mostly via the Rattlesden inter-club league meet. Back at TIB Will Day went round the President's Triangle twice...but the man of the moment is Pete Ryland who claimed the first 300km+ flight to be flown from Tibenham this season and the highest scoring ladder claim of the year so far! Well done Peter.
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http://www.bgaladder.co.uk/dscore.asp?FlightID=20302

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http://www.bgaladder.co.uk/

Poor piss planning

Having been on duty on Saturday while nobody at NGC was making use of the weather that allowed huge flights in the rest of the country - nothing was going to stop me flying on Sunday.

I arrived at 10 and was rigged pretty quickly thanks to Jo Hoy's patience. The forecast wind and the actual wind suggested pushing straight into wind was the best option so I declared Crowland Bridge o/r for 189km as RASP had looked "a bit funny" - I think this was probably a sign of streeting and occasional over development and later wave influence as the wind went more NWly.

Launching at 12:15 into a 2kt climb to 3,000 was enough to call a start and begin pushing up wind - as always the first good energy line ran straight towards Old Buckenham - so I called them on 124.40 and was allowed through - obviously too windy for meat bombs.

The fist need to climb came a few k short of Scoulton where 4kt average took me quickly to 3,500 and then it was off following the energy with the pull ups and slow downs under the cu keeping me high thought the 20kt head wind was knocking down the xc speed. At this stage I realised I should have put water on and thinking of water - oh f**k no pee bags!

At Wisbeach I had enough height to run in and make the turn lowish at about 1,500' and start what was promising to be a quick romp home - but 5kt 12km out had to be taken so I turned at a very conservative 3,500' - making the first leg 1hr 30m for 62kph.

The return leg was a breeze - after topping up 15km after the turn to 4,700' the next glide was 50km to the edge of D208 with an achieved L/D of 100:1. Arriving at the Danger area at 2,700' I needed some extra to take me over the top, and another 5kts to 4,000 left me 1,000 over a 3kt M/C final glide - most of it at Vra as it was rough - the leg taking 40m for 152kph and an overall speed of 88kph.

Any lessons to learn?

1) Preparation - there were pee bags in the trailer
2) Water - you can always dump it - can't dump it if it isn't there
3) Optimism - I feel that the minimum I should have declared was 300km

Ladder Posting here

Twice around in late afternoon.

Saturday April 25 TIB-DIS-PIC-NOE-TIB
With the DG back on line and two short flights made in April, I was cursing missing the good weather found by John and Ray earlier in April, due to ongoing building work at my place and running the business in hard times, but Saturday looked possible, depending on which forecast was correct, either before or after the predicted weak cold front. Rain in the West.
Mid morning rigged with help of Mark, whose comment " Where is everyone?" was answered by me, "We are here, let's get rigged!" to forestall him getting stuck into a late breakfast from Delia.
Some short local soaring with weak conditions was going on, but as I finished fettling I could see the 7 to 8 eighths cloud which had rolled in from the South beginning to thin behind, so I decided that it must be a very weak cold front indeed. (A strong cold front is more common at this time of the year, which normally consists of towering walls of cloud, rain and often thunder for less than an hour, followed by bright, crisp cool air. Normally good soaring conditions, but often unstable with smaller localised showers with snow above 2000 feet........ good fun!)
Clearance of overcast took another half hour or more, but eventually I was up into unstable air but disappointingly low cloudbase at 3000 feet with only Norman in 20 for company, plus the occasional 2 seater. I messed about locally for over an hour, noticing that the cloud base was rising, even though I did not get near it due to rejecting weak climbs often. Of course, this was a very weak front, so the whole thing was very mixed up and the new airmass was slow to become its pure self. Decision was to start as soon as I could do so at 1000m, so with a climb at last to 3800 feet, I burned the height a bit and made a start at 14.53. I was far too cautious as it panned out, as the conditions improved rapidly, so that by the time I was thermalling close to Watton and watching their cadets launching, the cloudbase was almost 5000 feet and I found my vario shouting "6 knots!!" So from then on, a fast run with a wide detour away from Costessey, I was round in 1 hour 21 min.
This was too good to waste, so I thought another lap was in order, but unfortunately I did not get away from my finish height and relaunched(thank you Iron Thermal) and restarted at 3330 feet at 16.37. Faster first two turnpoints, but then the sky was beginning to clear of clouds and the brisk 15 knot wind was increasing. At Norwich East, I could smell the sewage but did not expect to get back, so messed about trying to get enough height from Thorpe Business Park for final glide. I failed and set off directly upwind to Tib, expecting not to make it. However, due to luck and it being directly into wind, I found enough reduced sink in the blue street that I did manage to make a competition finish, unobserved, as all the gliders were away and everyone was in the bar. 1 hr 37. Thanks Dave for helping to derig.
So, a very good afternoon's flying! 2 complete laps of the triangle and my fist ladder entry of the year.
Lesson learned: do not be impatient. If I had started 30 mins later and just done the one lap, I could easily have increased my 86 kph by another 10. Ray still leads the President's Triangle mini comp.

Please put all your flights away from Tib on the National ladder. This then forms the club ladder for NGC and all flights posted with logger files are counted towards the ladder trophy. Current holder is Tom Smith.
See it on the BGA ladder:
http://www.bgaladder.co.uk/DispLadder.asp?Season=2009&ClubID=NGC&Ladder=O&PageSize=9999&ExComps=&Log=Y

Peter

(PICture is PIC with its new thermal generating wind turbines!)

Best flight yet

To go or not to go, that is the question. Whether it is nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and glides of a poor day or to stay at home and do something useful!

I was up at the crack of dawn to check RASP and the other forecasts. We were still in the grips of the stable high pressure air that has dominated for quite some time but there was a cold front due to pass though during the day which might change things. Anyway, I decided to stay at home and to try to finish off my kitchen worktops. I was keeping half an eye on the weather as I was interested to see if the cold front would make much difference. By lunchtime I had pretty much forgotten about it all when I noticed a tiny cumulus cloud through the window. 'Oh my god,' I said out loud. Poor Robyn thought I had just discovered something terrible in one of the cupboards. 'I've got to go,' I said. She now understood exactly what I meant!

I got to the airfield at about 1:30 and put my name on the list. People were just managing to stay up. There were thermals around but they were pretty tight and disorganised due to the relatively stiff Southerly wind. The K21 was free so I took a winch launch with Jan due to the fact that I was still getting back into it after a long layoff. We found a little lift but were back on the ground fairly shortly. The remnants of the front were starting to clear and it was all beginning to look rather promising. I had a feeling this was going to be a good chance for me to get a decent flight in. Timing seems to be everything in gliding and my turn in the Astir came round just about perfect. I got about 1350' from the winch and pushed South into the wind hoping to pick up some lift. It's a great feeling flying into lift, especially off the winch when conditions look good. So I was off, right up to 3000'. I have flown on days with reasonable lift but never anything as good as this. It just seemed to be getting better and better with the cloud base eventually reaching 5000' plus. For the first time I had the feeling it could actually be possible to go somewhere by flying from thermal to thermal. Not that I did go anywhere, but I'm sure I could have. After what seemed like ages I radioed down to see how long I had been up. Jenny told me 50 minutes and that there wasn't anyone else waiting for the glider. X-ray 19 told me to stay up for at least an hour and ten to get a bronze leg. At the time I thought this was Ray Hart flying Jenny's ASW 19 but I now think it was John R K. What he didn't tell me at the time was that if I had stayed up for 2 hours I could have got something towards my cross country endorsement. Anyway I decided I would just stay up there until someone told me to come down. The air was crystal clear by now and the view was stunning. It's just amazing how quickly things can change when a different air mass comes through. There was lift everywhere and I really felt like a proper glider pilot. Inevitably that call eventually came so I pulled the air brakes and was on the ground in about 10 minutes. I did a rubbish landing. Ray said the third one was OK!. There was an hour and thirty nine in the log book, which was by far my best and longest flight so far. I felt so calm and happy, having achieved that magical combination of a free glider, and perfect conditions.

When I got home I looked up the satellite pictures of the day (see below). You can clearly see the cold front pushing away the hazy high pressure air and replacing it with clear unstable air which immediately started to boil.


8am

12am

4pm

That's more like it!

As I said "always make a declaration".

Will on duty, and as the morning progressed more pilots appeared. Having already done the monthly check on the winch, once again the ASW19 was rigged. A few others had done similarly: Ray; Paul W. ; Barry and Ben; Mark (the CFI); Des and Dave; Phil H; Phil S plus others I am sure I missed. A later start than planned, the sky took a while to get going, but Ray and I were off to christen the new version of The President's Triangle (TIB-DIS-PIC-NOE-TIB). Cunningly devised to be over 100km, away from the western stub projection of Norwich International Airport but close enough to remind them we have the right to be here (although we do live in harmony).
At about 14.07 I took a winch launch, and then again 10 minutes later, connecting this time. Ray was off first time and, given his speed had probably finished before I got to 3000'. I got round pretty briskly and took a thermal before finishing just to extend the flight time!
Great views over the city and a splendid inauguration. On landing a tired looking Ass Cat (Jan)asked if I would mind taking a trial. 16.30 and the sky was dying quickly but the trial had a great 30 minute flight. I derigged and set off for the committee meeting, a glorious end to a glorious day!
Art; you have to be in a glider by 14.00 if you are going to get that silver height, never mind the Tiger Moth. They don't need thermals (noisy, smelly, dirty, engined things!)

Turned out nice again...

The morning started clearer than yesterday with hopes from RASP of thermals up to 5000ft. Will ran the day, with myself, JRK and Ben Magnani flying the trial lessons. After a runway change the soaring started around midday.

The Astir N12 returned back into service after its C of A and Bob Grieve test flew it ready for George Backowski to completed his silver height - well done George (apparantly he's never bothered claiming it).

Paul Wilkinson finished his BI acceptance flights with Mark and is now ready to join the roster - well done Capt Wilko.

When the K13 was returned to Will a number of AFRs and checks were completed, spinning being the theme of the day

Many gliders were rigged on such a good forecast, and tasks planned. Tasks seemed to be of the order of 100-150km as the weather appeared to be locally good, thermal strength between 3-5knts and cloudbase reported over 5000 at times. However the top cover spoiled the day around 4pm.

Those going places included Ray Hart (doing the presidents triangle in just over an hour), Dave Taylor, Des O'Brien, Ben M, Barry Marcham, JRK, Tom Smith, Phil Hayward, Mark Wright and probably a few others - it was quite busy. Dont forget to put your flights/traces on the ladder!

I had originally planned to come and fly the Astir as my glider is already over in Wales, but I didn't managed to get into the Astir until well after the sky had collapsed, with a fantastic 9 minute flight! Never mind, I did do over 2 hours instructing in lovely soaring conditions and it was great to see so many club members out.

Pre-Frontal...

A few flights on aero-tow and in the Falke and G109 motor-gliders, plus a few other power movements. There was a little scratchy soaring but nothing like yesterday! Peter Molloy, visiting CFI from Dorset GC, enjoyed the best soaring flight of the day at just under an hour. An evening pre-frontal wave slot added some interest and the G109 allowed us to explore some gentle, if rather short-lived, lift (engine-off) towards the end of flying.

Always make a declaration

What a day! Phil S standing in for Will, a gin clear sky (at 9.00 BST), very bleary eyed (clocks going forward etc.) I figured that I might rig just in case. I helped get the club gliders out first as there was a BI course running and they needed the K13 for high tows. DIed the K21 and helped tow it out. Not many folk rigging, Ben and Barrie rigged Libby and Tim and Chris rigged HNC. As I reached the launch point a newish member needed a finishing lesson on how to use the winch. Well the sky still looked poor so why not? Only one launch needed so we dragged the cable back to the launch point only to discover that all the other winch driving pilots had gone for tea. Our new recruit was thrown in at the deep end and so I gave him a briefing on my launch and sent him back for his first unaccompanied launch. I waited for Ben to take an aerotow and then pushed on line for the winch. Away.... not bad for a first timer, 1000' before I released to prevent over speeding. Thermals were just building and I got to 2000' with no problems. From then it was charging around the market towns of Norfolk and a foray over the city at 4000'. A better pilot would have declared but I had a great time (4 hours and 17 minutes worth). Cloud base reached 5200' at times but cold feet defeated me in the end. What a marvelous day.

Not much ...

Front, trough, front, trough.

Ray Hart and I sat in on a BI Course and helped where needed - so you can now watch the BGA Winch Launching Safely videos on the computer in the briefing room - http://www.gliding.co.uk/bgainfo/safety/safewinchlaunching.htm

We also redesigned the "President's Triangle" so that it doesn't cross the Norwich approach.

A PDF will be distributed but the basic details are

TIB - NOE (Norwich East) - PIC (Pickenham) - DIS - TIB
or reverse

for 116km

Blustery but Bright Sunday

A very bright and windy Sunday eventually saw soaring flights of over an hour for George B'ski. Will Day, John Kinley and Geoff T & Barry Marcham. Not to be left out, I shook the cobwebs off my Cirrus and after a shakedown and trial flight following winter maintenance, managed over an hour myself. Conditions not ideal for XC with 21kts of wind at 2k and launching off 33 meant an interesting approach with the trees providing plenty of curl-over. At least the vis was much better than the previous 2 days.
Andy Vidion ran the day with help from Ben Mangnani and Jonathan A. Thanks to Paul Thompson and his wife for providing the catering.
Others out were, Grum Ashworth, Mark Wright, James Francis Andrew Hewitt, Mike Tate and Pete C.

Hazy Day

A murky start did not put people off rigging, and although the thermals got going late under a thick inversion, it turned into a good local soarable day with many flights over 1hr. Dave Munro ran the day, with John Roche-Kelly kindly stepping in to take some trial lessons.

Our ab initios turned out in force including Oliver Bloomfield, Ben and Steve Kirk. Amongst the others out enjoying the day were Tom Smith, Chris Lawrence, Tim Highton, Mark Wright, Art Kerkoff, Geoff Tilly, Josie Briggs, Paul Wilkinson, James Francis. Ian Atherton and Roy Colman took a trip in the Grob 109 to Rattlesden returning at the end of flying.

I did just over an hour and a half in the 20, cheating a bit by taking a high tow above the 3000ft inversion and dropping down into the top of the thermals! Still a nice flight despite the poor visibility.

4 hours of thermals...

A misty start with the sun burning through to rapidly raise the cloudbase during the morning. The dew point quickly climbed above the inversion and the day went blue - but that was definitely not the end of the thermals. The inversion rose to around 3000ft and despite a SE wind there was around 4 hours of usable thermal activity. Country member Roy Colman got the longest flight of the day in Astir NG1 with 3 hours soaring. Others out included Paul Wilkinson doing some BI course prep, Tony Griffiths and Tim Highton, with Ian Atherton instructing and Jim Lawn providing the aero-tows.