March 23rd. 2009

Recent News
21.03.2009

What a good day it was. Apart from two designated circuits and a spinning check, all were prolonged soaring flights. Coming back down was a deliberate move rather than simply running out of height. Lift was abundant everywhere, strengths of six to eight knots quite common. Coming in from the east, we found the transition into the sea breeze affected area at about Toko.

Steve Barham had the longest flight, which involved nearly getting out to Te Wera in the course of a 50k attempt. He was thwarted by a rather large blue gap, which a bit later, the Discus ventured into before it turned towards Tututawa and the Puniwhakau area. A valiant attempt Steve. Those necessary thermals will be all lined up for you pretty soon.

Great to see James Walker on the field. Not for long though, for he was away with Peter Cook in WZ for an hour and only came back because his conscience (and Peter’s?) told him (them?) that there would be others waiting for flights. Sure enough, there were three voucher flights, all of whom had good flights. I might say that as a private owner, its good not to need a conscience!

Andrew Skene and Tim notched an hour in JB plus a couple of circuit flights later. A circuit for Glyn Jackson. Glyn Jackson thus renewing his gliding habit after a few weeks away. Les Sharp enjoyed the towing with a number of thermal assisted tows. An open day at Hawera airfield generated a lot of radio traffic, some un-necessarily irascible about glider intentions. (Not our gliders.)

It was a cheerful group that gathered in the clubhouse at the end of the day for a beer. Some one asked me why I was quiet. It was just that I was really enjoying listening to the chatter and remembering where we, (the club) had come from to get to this day.

Stats: Aircraft Time Flights
JB 2hrs 21m (6)
WZ 2hrs 20m (3)
TE 1hr 26m (1)
XC 1hr 25m (1)
RWS 1hr 22m (11)
Best height: 4787ft.

Peter Miller
Club Captain