Peter Miller. 1988

Flying The Sea-breeze

December 1988

A flight with John Spence in the Blanik JB and a seabreeze front.

I've actually waited many years to write this story but it was too good a flight to leave unrecorded. Gliders leave no tracks in the sky for others to follow, nor can they tell their own tales. It was also important for me, recovering from what had been a serious illness, making such a morale boosting flight.

December 18 was one of the better days at German Hill with a sea breeze front nicely positioned over the airfield and John Spence had just returned having treated Keith Black to ninety minutes soaring under it. Suffering from a motor neurone disease, Keith could only communicate by giving the thumbs-up signal, which he did regularly throughout the flight.

I knew enough about soaring to know that I too could get a good flight under this front but, as yet not cleared for solo flying, persuaded John that he really wanted to go again. Good sport that he is, he agreed and off we went.

Cloudbase would have been about 4000ft asl and we quickly reached this off tow.
Moving out to the edge of the front, we were still in lift and began to rise up along the edge of the cloudstreet. We never turned but weaved alongside the face, swinging into the bays and steeply around the crenellated headlands of white. Neither of us talked much, so absorbed were we in the moment. As pilots we can be treated to sights of extraordinary beauty and this was such a moment. We had that part of the sky to ourselves and ourselves alone.

Continuing this pattern and retracing the flight-path, back and forth, we climbed the face of the cloudstreet in smooth wave-like conditions, then up and over the top at 6500ft scarcely believing our good fortune, the sky a brilliant blue contrasting with the pristine white of the cloud tops.
With an abrupt jolt back to reality, John remembered that he'd gotten sunburnt on the previous flight and it wasn't getting any better so we flew away over Carrington road, gently easing down and seeing the Astir, flown by Rod Smith, charging up and down under the front, quite unaware of where we had been. I think neither of us minded really. It was a flight we've both long cherished for what it was.

Peter Miller.