May Bank Hols

The curse of the Bank Hol weekend stuck again last week. A few dogged individuals managed to brave the weather on Saturday and Sunday, as Eric reports:

"Saturday,  Gary managed a creditable 21 mins in DVX, Russell flew a couple of TL’s and Brent and Lech kept the ball in the air.

Sunday had very blustery winds.  We launched from the short hard and I got 1400’ launch but that apart,  Phil flew Mary’s mate, Leslie, 5 times and Mary once. Conditions very sporting....."

Monday was less disappointing than the weekend, and was forecast to be sunny and thermic! Arrived at the club just in time to see Graham disappearing off into the blue yonder in 60. Rigged H20 and ambled up to the launchpoint, where Bruno had been off soaring in DVX with a course member, and G2 had been soaring off the winch. Paul M had his Cirrus ready for launch and Paul N was about to go xc in his DG800…..

 

Pinged off a few more launches from the eight acre, then swopped ends due to the stiff South westerlies, and moved to the North end of the long run. Top cover began to come in after lunch, then it went a bit blue, then cycled again to give some nice clouds before the top cover encroached again after 3pm. 

Jon C, Dave P, Jon L, Derrick,  John W, Tess, Charles and Bruno et al all had nice soaring flights, and we had CCC & the Skylark out as well as DVX. I flew when the sky had a second lease of life, and though it was difficult to get away, once above 1500' it was easier to find thermals. Got some nice shots of the airfield and the very bright crops around…

Clive & Phil went flying in the chipmunk, and Paul M went off in the Falke when the day got less soarable. We had a late visitor from Aston Down en route home. Graham was last one home having completed almost 400km of a 530km task.  Altogether a nice day and the best slot from the weekend. Thanks to Bruno & Kath for their usual efficient running of the airfield.

Juniors Visit Day 2 - Saturday 18th April

We had a 'Winter series' visit from the UK Juniors group this weekend. Our visitors started arriving on Thursday evening, with more arrivals on Friday together with gliders. Lucy had organised the Regionals Food Team to come and help, so Jessie & helpers provided Friday food, while Jane & Tracey came to run breakfast at the weekend, and we had a sandwich rota including Ziz & Mary Wootton. Coming down to help on the Saturday John & I found the welcome sight of a sausage butty to get things started!! Definitely an improvement on my normal breakfast!

Juniors glider covered in postits! (don't ask...)

Saturday started blue and windy, with c15kt north easterlies with the forecast to be mainly blue. There was a briefing at 10am for the many visitors so whilst Rowan, Lucy, Poz (one of our Regionals regulars) and the others went through the operations for the day, the rest of us started club flying up at the launch point. Paul Fletcher was in charge and organised Andrew Phillips (Alex's Dad) and Danny to fly with John W, while Andy Moore (on one of his regular visits 'home' to Shenington) had the pleasure of a couple of practice launch failures with Paul. 

Mass glider rigging

Shortly after this, the juniors started arriving at the launch point in the top field and the gliders started lining up for aerotow or winching. Christine brought in her cub, and Jonathan May from Bicester flew in an Icarus tug - all three tugs were kept busy, and we flew 30 aerotows during the day. Small clouds began to form and though it was very windy, most of the gliders got away and went soaring. Poz had set a number of tasks starting from 50km to over 300km, with the smaller tasks staying within range of the airfield. Going upwind did prove quite challenging apparently, even to the glass ships, and conditions went properly blue out east, and there were a few landouts. There were quite a few visiting two seaters (plus Russell in JYR) taking youngsters cross country, and the two seaters were also kept busy. Dave S went off in 'DS' and reported that conditions deteriorated beyond Bozeat. 

All calm at the winch - look at that sky!!!

Not so quiet at the launchpoint!!

Lech and Sam did a magnificent job on Glidex at the launchpoint, though I think Lech appreciated a break on the winch late in the day! All was very calm up at the winch, with the biggest worry being whether we'd get the parachute over the fence with the stiff crosswind! All in all it was (for me at least!) a thoroughly enjoyable day, with the airfield buzzing, and lots of gliders disappearing into the sky under wispy clouds. Flying wound down around 6pm, and with most people back the hangar was packed and the bar opened. Mary's family came down to organise the evening meal (many thanks Michaela, Tracey, Damon and assorted helpers), and when we left early evening, the stampede for food had begun. 

Thanks to everyone who helped out. Great day - lets hope there will be many more like this. 

PS Saturday

Just had it confirmed that Dave Price got his silver height on Saturday! Nice one Dave.

Saturday 11th April

The day started with light rain but cleared quickly. The wind was strong, being 15-20kt so the club single seaters were left in the hangar, but there was plenty of good soaring and everyone who flew had a good flight. 

Dave Perkins & John W were on duty, and flew aerotow trial flights with a number of visitors - they all had very good flights, as did the visitor who flew with Paul Fletcher. Dave Price had the best flight of the day in a club glider, being up for almost 2 hours, and achieving a height of 5,300 ft - very impressive. John was able to go soaring in the K21 at 6pm.
 

Otherwise it was fairly quiet though a number of private owners went off and flew tasks. Graham flew over 550km in his nimbus, and Steve Tilling flew 430km in his DG800 (the 'mystery' glider being flown by Paul Noonan last w/e....identified at last!). Rowan was kept busy tugging, and thanks to Alistair and Lech for helping out.

 
Liz made curry in the evening for those staying around. All in all a good day.

John W

Wednesday 8th April

Another productive day at the club! Robert Batty was flying, young Alex Phillips had just arrived, his mother drove him from their home at Sibford. And I had picked up Danny Earl, also nearly 14 now. We bought a nice can of paint at Homebase, I had TOLD  (by email, so there is a record!)  the kid's families that they would be doing some painting ...so bring old clothes.....

First all the lads flew. Both Danny and Alex flew with Bruno, Gordon flew with Robert Batty, boys were pleased. Then I took Alex and Danny to the NEW BLUE LOO and we located rollers, brushes, paint,  I made Alex change his shirt, which was a souvenir of Russia from his holiday there last weekend!   And left them to it - Alex is so tall that he doesn't need a ladder to paint the ceiling!   An hour later they arrived back at the launchpoint,  telling me the job was finished!   so everybody flew some more.   A  young girl arrived with her mother; she is, I think, 16, and is making splendid progress.  Her mother and I had a good  conversation...she is American, from New York City, they have a home near Shenners!   so I said to the mum, why don't YOU have a  go?  So she did!   And loved it.

So amazingly, the median age of the gliding club has just moved down significantly!   Juniors galore!   And more women!  (My lodger Leslie is now thoroughly hooked, she is dreaming about flying. She sent the photo from the website flying blog to her mother in France, and it is her facebook photo as well!)  

 Bruno took me aside to tell me he was worried that the boys had paint on their clothing....I told him that I had emailed the Mums to send them with old clothes.  Alex changed his shirt when I told him, but still had on his best new school trousers!   Said he, "My  Mum is going to kill me!"

When Mum came to pick him up, with his little brother and a friend, at first she was a bit upset, but then she watched him attaching the cable, and launching a glider, and she was delighted, and so pleased that he is happy  at the gliding club - paint on pants didn't matter so much.
Little brother and other kid were impressed too!

Mary

...the last of the Long Weekend

Monday 6th April:

Fog stopped play till lunchtime, which was a little frustrating as we all knew the weather was up there! When it cleared it was great.....lots of gliders came out to play and most of them stayed up for long periods. Graham P took 60 cross country, Dave Smith & John le Coyte and disappeared off, as did Phil & Russell in JYR. Also seen - HJD, HMB, Paul Mucha's cirrus and Paul Noonan's new toy which no-one seemed to know the registration for, but it has an engine!  Everything serviceable belonging to the club was in the air, which was great, and we kept all 3 buggies in use too! More of this please!

Tess

Stacked and ready....

Beginning to lose the private gliders now...

Lucy trying to revise...honestly!!

"Easter MONDAY – 40  launches, including a good handful of self-launchers, 14 flights from which were in excess of 30 mins. John Rogers flew his first tugging after a layoff of 4 months and in his words ‘bounced’ on landing.  Trisha found wave over Banbury at about 2.5k,   although she had already been to 3.7k after some 6k climbs. She looked happy. Bruno advises having flown a visitor, 90 yrs. of age, who had flown RAF Javelins and Lightnings, and whose station boasted a Tiger Moth of which he was the only person qualified to fly it, so he did, a bit.

Jonathan May flew in with Julia Robson who is going to put her shoulder to the Shenington wheel and assist Lucy for the visit of the Juniors. 

I caught the sun. Also a 2k climb to 3.3k in Ruby aka  HJD the K6E. Alastair sharpened up his K6E aerotowing techniques. 

You missed a tremendous soaring day, just the right start to the season. Don't be shy, there was plenty of spare capacity for late comers and we didn't shut down 'til gone 5. See you in the week? It's going to be good"

Eric 

Eric looking as if about to go mountaineering....

Just look at that sky!!!!!!!!!

A long weekend.....

Thursday 2nd April :

The Bank holiday weekend started early (!) with excellent weather. On Thursday Carole, Ellen and I had a working lunch to discuss the implications of social media to the club operations. I think that the actions have been written up and circulated. Afterwards I resumed my painting in the new Simulator room. Paul Barnes turned up and pinched Bruno's K13for an hour's soaring, and Bruno used his downtime to show Shaun how to cover his aircraft's rudder. Tim D and the Chairman flew DVX after it emerged from its workshop cocoon where it had been for five months and went soaring.

 

Strange things mark 1 - Shenington members are witty as always.......

Friday 3rd April:

It rained all day Friday - so much for the BH!

Saturday 4th April:

Weather not great, though not as wet as yesterday. We had 6 flights including 2 glamorous ladies whose presence generated a larger than normal ground crew staff to choose from! Russell enjoyed the experience. Liz produced an amazing turkey dinner with all the trimmings (not crackers!) for 17 people, plus sticky toffee pudding.

Sunday 5th April:

Lesley goes flying with the CFI!

Strange things seen at Shenners mark 2 - Car in duvet!

A mixed bag of weather - managed 19 launches. Glen Evans flew solo twice and Sam Tomline regained his currency in gliders. John Rogers flew 35 mins in the K21 for the longest flight of the day. Mary brought her lodger Lesley and both flew with Phil M. Clive, Phil H., Sam and Christine all had fun flying the tug.

After flying a crowd of us went off to the very welcoming Roebuck pub for a slap up meal.

Eric

Wed 25th March

Looks like the midweekers have been having fun again....Wednesday certainly looked nice from Birmingham airspace....Mary reports that Phil A & Russell took the Duo JYR off cross country, while Graham took the Nimbus off and flew 346km of a 380 km task (look for Shenington on the BGA ladder site : http://www.bgaladder.co.uk/Enquiry.asp). Don Puttock was flying this week, with Dave Gould flying the tug. Alistair Frier was doing some midweek aerotow flying, Mary went soaring in CCC, and everyone had a great day. Thanks to Dave Smith for trimming the greensward and giving us the perfect surface for gliding.

Thursday looked pretty good too, hope all you retired/shift working/self employed folk made the best of it!

Weekend 21-22 March 2015

Stuck in Birmingham last Sat/Sun as I was, due to work, I gather that I missed a lovely Spring weekend! 

Cold temperatures overnight then blue skies and some cloud meant that there was good soaring to be had. Dave Price, having done his LPC slot, had his just rewards with over an hour's soaring at what appeared to be cloud base. Paul Noonan went off flying in his glider,  Graham Paul went flying with Paul Mucha in 60, but couldn't manage a take off on the grass from the top field with the light winds (go karters being in residence). A second attempt on the North south run was apparently much more satisfactory! Robb Batty had his first 'real' awkward height cable break in CCC and made an excellent job of the recovery and landing. He flew the K8 later, together with other members. New junior member Alex Phillips was introduced to the joys of gliding and was a great help at the launchpoint all weekend. Meanwhile Christine and Clive were doing some training in the tug and we had some visitors to take flying as well.

Thanks to Alan & Trish for driving the winch most of the day, and Mary for cooking soup and cake. Let's hope we have more of the same next week. (NB. Last soup this coming w/e, then back to fending for ourselves, except for the 'juniors' weekend and the regionals week when there will be plenty of food and cakes! You have been warned..... ).

Saturday March 14th

Saturday was a bitterly cold day - and the few brave souls who ventured out wore lots of layers. Many members decided that it was instead a day for fettling!

With the karters in residence we were flying from the top field, and just had triple Charlie at the launch point. John W and Danny did some training flights, and then the cloud lowered and the drizzle started. We all sloped off to the clubhouse to thaw out and eat soup and cake, courtesy of Mary, then back to the launch point around 2pm as it began to clear up. Aimee, Cat and Penny - key members of the Oxford Belly Dancing Group who entertained us in summer - came to have a trial flight each, and Paul Fletcher took each of them flying in turn. Cat was quite apprehensive before going up but came back grinning widely.

Rather more jumpers in evidence on this visit!......

 

Norman got checked out again after a short break, and Lucy went solo on the winch! A few of us took solo flights - Paul Fletcher gained longest flight of the day with an epic 10 minutes!

At the end of the day it was suddenly beautifully clear, and Rowan, then Christine, had short flights in the tug just for the sheer hell of it. We also had some surprise visitors in the field by the winch...

Thanks to Eric, Alastair and Lucy for winching, and John & Paul for instructing. Kit away, we barely made it to the AGM in time. There was good news for Paul F - someone else had volunteered to be Treasurer! So we have a new Chairman in Andy Linfield, Christine Bell as Treasurer, and Dean Batty has joined the committee.  It was also good to catch up with founder member (and President) Phil Brennan who is too busy competing in seniors international athletics to have time to glide at the moment!  Liz fed us tea & cake to complete the day. Now all we need is some proper spring weather.....watch this space, and get your glider ready. It won't be long now......