What a great day!
Plenty of activity today on the field with
all of the club gliders out, and a full flying list from start to end. Although
we had to wait for the mist to clear before starting flying (and early flights
had to navigate clear of small patches of low wispy cloud), we did 45 flights
and packed up just after the sun set at around 6:30pm. The sun shone all day,
the clouds looked good, and Mary fed us soup and cake in the first 'soup
dragon' slot of autumn.
Paul Noonan was in charge with Paul Fletcher helping
out and they kept the two seaters busy all day flying with ab initios Amy,
Ashley, Rachel and new member Kieran, plus a couple of visitors. The K8 and Astir were in constant use with
many soaring flights and a couple of our more recent soloists improving their
personal bests - Martin Jones gained his first bronze soaring flight in DVX,
and Nigel Curtiss only just missed his, but still enjoyed his longest solo flight
to date. John Rogers had longest flight of the day in his DG, staying up for
over two and a half hours, while Lucy, Terry and Paul F had good soaring
flights. Other solo pilots included Robin, Tez, Jon Carlton, Jane, Martin L,
Tess, Jon Luisada, Clive and Paul Mucha.
The motorglider was kept busy with Robin,
Nigel Clarke and Lee all taking it up. Rowan was doing instructor checks with
Russell in both the K21 & K13 - poor Russell never made it to the top of any
winch launch but did at least enjoy a soaring flight later off the aerotow. Colin,
John James, and Lee all flew power, and Roger Andrews flew in for a brief
visit. Our comps committee had their first Regionals meeting in preparation for
next year. The only one who had a quiet day was tuggie Dave Gould who took
Rowan & Russell off to do some spinning in DDB, but otherwise enjoyed a
relaxing time on the ground. Thanks to all those who helped out, especially our
band of winch drivers. I only wish we'd had a few more days like this in summer!
Tess