Eye in the Sky Jan 2007

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Sun 28 Jan 2007

Report by James Roy

A great winter day at Bell for the hangies today. A little windy and bumpy at times but on the whole reasonably smooth with some nice winter thermals up to about 1000ft ATO - roll on the spring!. Spoilt a good day by ground looping and busting an upright at the end - doh!

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Sat 27 Jan 2007

Report by Alastair Florence

 

Bell Hill, no need to say much about the day as nearly all the club was there.

Peachometer reading 7 in general mode, 8. 75 in winter mode, a classic day of winter soaring. One thing probably worth mentioning, despite being busier than many a good summers day, I did not witness any incidents of bad airmanship or near misses, and we were all a bit rusty, pats on the back all round (probably were a few I missed though).

Report by Mike Bretherton

 

Great smooth thermic flying today at Bell, I counted nearly 30 gliders in the air at one point. The conditions were almost identical to the 21st January in 2006.

Mike Bretherton

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Sun 14 Jan 2007

Report by Alastair Florence

 

WSW and a bit breezy first thing so I went to St. Aldhelms. With gust up to 20mph on T/O I sat it out for 20 mins. As a patch of cloud went over the back the wind eased to a just about launchable strength. Must admit though after a months lay off I was a little twitchy on the launch pad. Still no probs once in the air and stacks of lift but certainly on the stronger side.

With height of 500ft ato odd I tried for Houns Tout a couple of times but baled out as there was a bit to much West in it to push against, (sometimes the Tout dosen't work either when its like this as I have found out to my cost). Flyable right down to the coastguards. After about an 1 1/2 hours I was thinking about doing something else, a big bunch of cloud was passing about 2 miles away and I seemed to be going up un naturally fast so decided it was a good time to run for the car park.

The Sitephone messages suggested Ringstead was ok so went down. It was just blowing out as I arrived but patience payed off and got another session in later PM although a bit stong still.

Nev A was putting on a spectacular Fly-mowing display with his hang glider.

The hangies had a good time between the PG sessions.

After dusting off the cobwebs from the peachometer I reckon 2 sites in one day mid Jan deserved at least 7. 5 although the flying was nowt fantastic.

Report by Shamus Pitts

 

Hi I had 2 flights today, one 40 minute and one 55 minute flight, making it out to the cliffs both times (for the first time)! The wind was strong and off to the west but there was plenty of lift. I hit some sink and a headwind on the way out to the cliffs the first time but still made it with about 100' to spare, and still had 150' ATO when I finally flew back to takeoff.

The second time I went out I was climbing pretty much the whole way out to the cliffs. After half an hour and gains of 450' ATO I decided to head back. After leaving the cliffs I was sinking all the way and I hadn't travelled very far when I only had 150' ATO and a long way to go! I decided to head back to the cliffs as they were quite close and build up some more height, which is when I started to get scared! When I got back to the cliffs I was still sinking and the lift seemed to have disappeared - I was lower than I had ever been and starting to run out of ideas! I was now 80' below takeoff and too low for the main cliff to work, so I headed out to a smaller ridge in front. There was a bit of rotor as I approached it which cost me more height but my vario eventually started to beep slowly! Eventually I was level with takeoff but a good 300' below where I wanted to be to glide back. I couldn't believe I was scratching when it had been so lifty only a few minutes earlier. There were still a few people floating about quite happily so the main cliff must still have been working if I could get high enough. Slowly but surely I built my height back up - I was about 300' ATO when I tried to glide back before so I wanted more than that to try it again, but I was struggling to break 200'. Judging by the ship anchored in the bay, the wind had switched round to the west more which probably explained the change in the lift, so I used the more westerly faces of the cliff and eventually was 350' ATO and ready to try gliding back again (it had taken me 20 minutes to get back up!).

As I set off towards takeoff I was constantly looking for landing options because I still didn't think I'd make it! Luckily I made it back with about 40' to spare, only to find the wind had dropped a fair bit, which probably explains the lack of lift as well! All's well that ends well, a couple of nice flights, a bit of a scare and an hour and a half in the log book - not bad!

 

Report by RW

 

Photos by JR.

 

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Tue 02 Jan 2007

Report by Alastair Florence

 

Not so much an EITS more of an EOTG (eye on the ground) I'm on compulsory leave and bored now. Corton Denham is the only Wessex site i've never visited and I know not many others have either. Hence I took a drive up to check it out today. Obviously wasn't going to be flyable also its weekends only here due to Yeovilton landing approach directly overhead, (its even got a landing light on top of T/O). See site guide.

Looks a nice site though, easy rolling launch, reasonable landing area, (photo dosent do Landing area justice really)(sun was also against me so the ridge pictures arnt great either but hopefully give an idea of the site) good clean grass slope no bushes trees etc till the bottom, good long fairly technical ridge run off to South and I reckon it must get quite thermic on the right days. Check out an airmap for XC potential ! not too much effort to get round Salisbury Plain then no probs until Oxford 100+Km.

Its a bit of a trek for us Coast dwellers but I'm really going to try and make a trip or two up there this year, certainly looks better than Bulbarrow.

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