After news of the great flights Barnsie, Dave, Karl, Ed, Pete and Geoff had at Tumut on Saturday the whole crew were keen on Sunday.
Pig Hill was the call with light northerly winds forecast. Deb and my parents, Trish and Terry came along to watch proceedings. Ed, Nick, Andrew L, Dave, Karl, Ryan, Barnsie, Nath, Pete and I provided the entertainmant.
It was to be Nick and Andrew’s first thermic flights. So we ran through what to expect and how to stay up:
- Pick a cycle where the wind is blowing straight up the launch
- Keep the nose down during the run in order to maximise your airspeed before leaving the ground.
- The best trigger point is the spur between the two launches
- Don’t turn back toward the hill until you are sure you have plenty of room to make the turn
- Leave the hill with enough height to make the bombout with plenty of time to set up a good landing approach.
A task was called – off to Yass then back to Dick Smith’s place at Gundaroo.
There was some hesitation on launch so I kitted up. I had to wait a while before there was a weak cycle straight up launch. The slight breeze up the slope was only just enough to get me off the ground even with a strong run which meant I only cleared the shrubs by a couple of feet. Exciting.
Off launch I was straight into a 1.5m/s climb over the usual spur. Even though the clouds up high were drifting to the NNE, the air down low was being sucked back into some rather intimidating looking clouds back over the Brindabellas. That made for a reasonable drift to the SSW at my altitude. Conditions on launch were still not that great so the others are forced to wait a while before they are able to get airborne.
A few times now I have been flying at Pig and watched the storms build over the range. I have noticed that hearing thunder while in a hang glider it not that easy so do not rely on your hearing as an indication of the severity of developing storm. Instead I am looking at the changes in size and colour of the building clouds. Though there is no imminent to the rest of the guys still on the hill I relay my concerns over the radio.
Not wishing to hang around I push north away from the real dark bits. As I was pushing headwind away from the storm that was growing in my direction, I was forced to go into race mode stopping for nothing less than 2m/s climbs. As this was stronger than day was producing it would be inevitable that I would hit the deck but at least at that pace I would be far enough in front of the nasty bits to be safe. Eventually, the ground and I became one near Murrumbateman.
At about this time the storm had moved away from launch. Rain was sheeting down between our two locations but conditions seemed to have improved enough for everyone to get off the deck. Unfortunately sled rides were the order of the day but it was some good scratching practice for everyone and safe landings all around.
A fun day out.
Pictures courtesy of Deb and my parents.
