Andrew has really been wracking up the airtime over the past week. Wracking up this sort of experience during what used to be considered the off season is exactly what is required to perform at your best as next season rolls around. Let’s hear about it:

The weekend of 9 – 10 May saw Dave and myself crack up around 3+ hours.  Sat Dave and I hit up Pig and enjoyed two extended sled runs turning in little bubbles that never managed to provide enough to climb in as they were short and sharp.  After 2 turns it would be gone and it was time to move on.  We observed two eagles fly past climb a few meters then fly off never getting any higher than the hill.  The inversion around was visible and it seemed that we were about at the top of it on the hill!  Top notch fun all the same.

Sunday Dave, Turtle, Barnsy, Marty (from VIC) and late in the arvo Porter flew Lake G (no cars were damaged during Porters Landing which was a relief ).  It was an absolute ripper of a day with smooth air and nice ridge lift.  About 1km North of Gearies Gap on the top of the ridge line there was a back burn happening and Dave managed to get up to 4500ft in a steady 200ft/min up.  I also managed to climb up but only to around 3700ft.

From here Dave flew the ridge all the way to Collector with my self and Turtle getting to the wineries a little low.  I turned back to the south to head back to the higher ridge and better lift where as Turtle kept going and ended up landing in a rather unusual landing paddock.  As he flew around to the winery he ended up lower than the ridge and lost lift and then couldn’t make it out to the lake so landed in a paddock between the highway and the ridge.  Funny as, but gutsy effort to try to punch north.  Lesson Learned here is to always have a nice place to land within glide   Dave and I top landed back at Gearies a little later and Dave headed home.  I stayed on to keep flying and enjoyed a number of top landings and flying on the south side flying in the air around my mates R/C gliders.  It is always cool flying around with R/C slope gliders.  I managed to grab one of my mates planes and turned it tail wind and let is go hahahaha.  Not nice I know but he was high and had plenty of height to recover in – fun times!

Tuesday 12 May saw Dave and I head to Stanwell Park for a leisurely Maz.  Our enthusiasm paid off with both of us cracking up over 2 hours.  After about an hour in the air Dave headed South to the next ridge.  I decided to go hell for leather for it also and was defiant to the end, which was a very low end at that!!!  I go to the south ridge very low and ended up having to turn back and land on the south side of Stanwell beach.  Lucky for me Tony Armstrong was on his way back to launch so after he confirmed that I was a Hangy I was in the car and on the way back to launch to get my car.  I drove back down to get my glider and after the quickest pack up and and then set up once back on launch I was airborne again.  By this point the wind had eased and the chance of flying up and down the coast any great distance had gone.  After a while Dave went into land approaching over a pond on the Southern side of the beach.  From the air it looked cool and once down he was straight on the radio telling me that I had to make the same approach as it was awesome.  After 20min I decided to land and came screaming in over the pond and landed on the beach.  It was nice to land in the silky smooth coastal air as it feels like you are landing on a bed of foam as it is so smooth you wouldn’t know you were flying which is a little different feeling after flying inland all summer!!!  A big thanks to Tony for taking me up to my car and having a laugh or two on the way.  Cheers.

Anyway a great week has been had as usual with the Canberra crew.  If only we were all keen we might get out there and fly more often !!!!!

Thief >;-)

It’s just a shame it doesn’t count when spread over two days Great flying never the less.

Highlights for me were flying with Geoff on Saturday and Ed on Sunday. Both of these guys are flying really well at the moment.

Here’s a couple of happy snaps from the flights.

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Tracklogs from the weekend here

Ed flew like a champ on Sunday:

Sunday was looking awesome, warmer than the day before and the sky was looking great with a band of Cus way of to the northeast but slowly building and getting closer to the airfield. Having failed to leave the tow paddock after a couple of tows on Saturday, and left on the ground listening in on the radio as the other guys do 70km plus flights, I was really keen give it a good run on Sunday. I had the dubious honor of having my glider already set-up in the shed so was able to get ready before the other guys and I wanted to take advantage of that by towing up first. The day before I’d towed up last so when I failed to connect with any lift on the first tow and needed a re-tow I was already 40mins behind them. By towing up first, if I needed a re-tow I’d simply re-tow at the end of the other guys and then be only 15 minutes behind them. Before I could jump in and get going I needed everyone to agree on a task so I could punch in some coordinates. The task committee met and decided that a place just past Condoblin was the goal (100.5km) so that we could have a shot at a 100km task in May – outrageous. While we were discussing where to fly to Wazza had a couple of low tows to practice his tows and his landings. His first tow left Bill less than impressed about his spot landing skills and he let Wazza know all about it. You see, Wazza didn’t land as close to the tow strip as Bill wanted so that he could re-load and go again as quickly as possible. He had a couple more tows and didn’t make that mistake again. Wazza was looking very comfortable on tow and his landings were getting better and closer to the tow point. Steve jumped in on the other end of the rope to normal, and towed up in the purple XT. He towed off the chest and at a couple of hundred feet the tow pressure got a bit much and he released. He spun the glider around and put it on the ground beutifully. If there is a machine that Steve can’t fly well I’m yet to see it – he is a natural aviator.

Steve quickly stowed the XT and jumped in the Dragonfly – Game On. With a "go, go, go" I was away. I released at 2000ft and sniffed around in some very narrow lift that was impossible to do a complete circle in for a while and managed to stay up for about 20 minutes scratching all the way down to the ground. It was a great flight where I got to practice those all important scratching skills and work on my tenacity while being relaxed. It was confidence building to be on the ground and find that some of the best pilots in the country had had the same experience that I’d had.

The wind had shifted a little so Trundle was adopted as the new goal, but we waited a little to give the day a chance to improve, as the day was proving to be not quite as good as it looked. On my second tow it took a while before I myself in zeros after releasing and I very slowly scratched up from about 1000ft to about 3000ft as I drifted steadily downwind from the airfield. While I was scratching up Trent and Dave were towed up to the thermal I was in above me so we were steadily joining up. Just as we were coming together at about 3000ft Trent headed out on course. I was just about to follow him when the lift I was in turned on and increased to about 400ft/min for a bit and the climb to 4000ft was a lot quicker than the previous 2000ft. Dave stayed in the thermal as well and was pointing  out some of the key indicators that he was noticing. Dave and Trent, and in fact all the Dusty Demons, are always willing to share their knowledge – great blokes to fly with. The lift slowed up and got patchy after about 4200ft so I headed off down course towards where Trent had been scratching over a big brown ploughed paddock for a while. I’ve been working on following lift lines ever since Scott Barrett taught me some great lessons on using lift lines at the Forbes comp. I was able to get over near Trent in pretty good shape and picked a group of brown paddocks with a rocky high ground in the middle, but as often happens, I found lift just before I got to where I was aiming. Again, it was very patchy and difficult to centre. Trent had dove in on another big brown paddock a km or so of to the right of course where he was getting really low. Eventually our thermals met up which surprised me a bit because we would have started in our respective thermals about 1500m apart. Eventually I noticed a very nice little cloud forming over us and again the 3000-4000ft climb was considerably better than the lower levels.

We headed off on glide again, cutting a bit more west to intercept the course line. It was fun gliding along beside Trent, working together to find our next thermal. Eventually we got into an area of lift and I wasn’t sure if Trent thought it was worth stopping for but I thought it was so turned in to find the centre. The thought had occurred to me that I could stay and mark this thermal and put in the work to centre it while Trent looks around for something a bit better. Great minds think alike (or fools never differ) so Trent read my mind and continued on for a couple hundred metres more looking for better lift. In the end the best lift was about half way between us and we searched there for a while but narrow zeros and a slow decent was all we found. We both "scedadled", but in different directions. Trent again ended up about a km or so right of course line while I moved over towards some high ground that appeared to be the trigger for a cloud downwind from it but found nothing. I moved on to another high point and then on the the north-south ridge that runs about 15km west of Forbes. I was hoping to get over the other side of the ridge to some big brown paddocks I could see but in the end I was a bit too low to get over it and had to land on the near side of the ridge in a big flat paddock between two ridges – out the back of some farmers property and no where near a visible road. I thought that I might be there for quite a while before my retrieve arrived – not ideal for a Sunday afternoon flight with a 3 hour drive back to Canberra.

I packed up and headed up to some high ground and was very lucky to catch a glimpse of a farmers house hidden in some trees – I would have walked another 5kms in the wrong direction had I not seen it. I arrived at the farmers place just as they were completing a livestock sale – alpacas of all things. The guy buying the alpacas agreed to give me a lift down to the front of the property where Brendan was on the way in Andrews 4WD.  So on a beautiful Sunday afternoon there I am, having had an awesome flight with a great mate, learnt heaps and standing in the back of a tray back Hilux holding on, 3 people jammed in the front on the bench seat and 3 alpacas jammed in the horse float following us down the road. I remember thinking to myself "Hang gliding is a great adventure – you just never know where you are going to end up". Just as the farmer was stopping to let me out I was surprised to see Dave’s Patrol go flying past so I got on the radio and turned the boys around to come and get me. Geoff had just been up to pick up Trent and Dave who both made it just over the other side of the ridge.

It was great fun flying with someone and working together. It’s something I’ve not experienced a heap as I often seem to find myself in the air alone, or occasionally with people who want to leech of me, which I’ve always thought strange, especially given my current skill level. I also love flying on my own – it is awesome because it’s completely up to me, it’s my decisions etc that keep my up there. But I also loved flying as part of a coordinated team. It’s a different type of buzz – it turns a solo sport into a briliant team sport. I would love to participate in more team competitions – they tell me that they used to have them.

I learnt a great lesson – if you can establish a pattern for the day – like the lift is over the brown paddocks – then keep using that until it doesn’t work. After finding lift over big brown paddocks I searched over high ground and surprise, surprise it wasn’t there.

Cheers

Ed

Dave finds a big hole and flies over it keeping the locals entertained:

Pete, Geoff and Ed jumped in my car on Saturday morning and we arrived at Forbes airport to find Steve making sure everything was ready to go for another weekend of safe, fun flying in this unbelievably reliable XC hot spot! Steve’s wife, Anet and son Blake were there to see how it all works of course. Trent with Deb and baby Makayla also there. Mr Keen, the Thief (Andrew L) joined us. Wazza and Bill Moyes, Mikael and family and Fanko!!! Yes, Franko, and watching his smooth skills on tow it seemed like he was as current as anyone.

Setting a task we were keen for triple figures in May so set an optimistic task (given 20^oc, blue sky and little wind) of 100km North past Peak Hill.

I was off first and was handed a lazy 200ft per minute climb which was about average for the day, taking it to base – 3000ft agl. Given the conditions it was hard to wait for company so I headed out on course. As the lift was slow and the thermals close together, I was leaving climbs at about 2500ft agl and on glide lowish NW of Parkes, I was approaching the large mining area. Noticing dirt rising slowly out of one of the giant holes I though I would fly directly over it, knowing that if it wasn’t working, I would have to land in the mining compound which would be a nightmare retrieve. But hey, this area of Australia has a great road network so it thought I would give the retrieve driver a challenge for once.

Flying over this massive hole relatively low was daunting. I had glide to an OK landing but some scary thoughts were going through my mind.

There was very little lift over the mine and I could only manage a couple of hundred feet. That would give me glide to a landing. Just beyond the second massive mine, so I would try that one on my way to land hoping a better thermal was being produced. I got a very ordinary glide on the way and getting lower I caught the eye of a few workers driving graders who stopped work to see what the hell I was doing. I arrived over the second giant hole lower than the pervious with more nightmare scenarios going through my head especially seeing water way down at the bottom of this one. But this time I got the lift I expected and it was the climb of the day, spewing straight out the abyss and cruised to near base and continued on out of the compound of the mining area.

Unfortunately I didn’t make goal, landing about 10km short of Peak Hill.

Trent and Geoff cruised over me in style as I was packing up. Andrew, Pete and Franko all had nice XC’s as well.

All retrieved we headed back to Munjal to have a beer with Terry (always a highlight of any trip out that way) but we cried ourselves to sleep when on arrival found that Terry had already crashed. He had a good excuse though, he had to get up early to fly his trike with Goldie. I’ll forgive you this time mate!!

New hangie, Brenden (Turtle) came along to see the aerotowing for the first time and after hearing a few horror stories about this way of getting airborne, it was great to see the drama free and safe towing that goes on at the weekends that Steve organises. Especially impressed by Steve’s towing skills, I’m sure Brenden will be towing with us shortly.

Massive thanks to Steve again for getting us in the sky and all the behind the scenes stuff you do to make these weekends so farken fun.

Get high,

Dave

Steve updates us on the weekend’s activities:

Hi Flyers,

The Forbes aerotow 2nd/3rd May was attended by 10 hang glider flyers and a couple of other pilots who flew the Dragon Fly.

The days were clear with very little cloud formation and steady but weak thermals.

It was great to see Wazza having a go out at Forbes after completing his aerotow endorsement with me at Rylstone about 2 years ago.

A big thank you to Brendan Cammack for coming out to see what aerotowing is all about and for helping out. I will give you some Dragon Fly time next time. Brendan is also a three axis pilot and was able to have a fly of the Dragon Fly. Though he found it a little like starting all over again after learning on the Jabiru, he went very well. Brendan is very keen to do his hang glider aerotow endorsement but is holding off until he has more experience (maybe we can keep him at the front of the line ????? Tugmaster Brendan ????? I like the sound of that).

Frank Chetcuti was out for a tow after a long absence from aerotowing and towed flawlessly, having good flights both days.

Michael Karmazin was in attendance with his wife and daughter as his retrieve crew. Michael has continually improved over the past two years and is now towing exceptionally well. It is always great to see you guys improving and enjoying your sport, but even better when you can bring along a happy willing helper.

The ever reliable Dusty Demon Crew from Canberra always put together a team that this time consisted of Andrew Luton, Trent Brown, Grant Edwards, Dave May, Geoff Robertson and Peter Dall.

These are the most dedicated inland hangies in Australia. They constantly amaze me with their enthusiasm and ability. These guys always show up keen as a newbie after his first successful flight and regardless of the weather they will set an almost attainable task and go for it with outstanding flights that at times exceed their goals. They work great as a team are always cheerful and best of all of at night time after a few beers have a great ability to turn even a circuit around the airfield into an epic and enthralling tale. OK the air field was hundreds of Km’s from launch.

I have tried a new mirror system on the Dragon Fly and can now see the glider on the other end of the line with much better clarity, this should help to improve my ability to fly even closer to the requirements of the pilot in the glider as I can see every little input and position of the hangie.

My last four trips out to my local hill for some solo flying have resulted in set up, now

wait, pack up and go home. No wonder these guys like to tow so much.

For further actual flight reports, go to www.thebombout.com

Finally THANK YOU BILL MOYES for supplying the Dragon Fly’s that make this all possible and for you assistance this weekend.

Still floating up here,

Steve.       

How good is Lake George? JP’s getting back into that sea breeze action…

Dave, Jeff and I were out at Geary’s for some Tuesday arvo flying. A steady easterly made for some good ridge soaring, but it later switched to a southerly, spicing things up!

I was up first, but a light south easterly had me bombed out quickly. A word up from Dave to get height with a quick right turn and then fang it north led to success. Back up in the air, following Dave and Jeff up to North Launch, but they left me for dead and flew all the way up to Collector and beyond. Apparently Dave, ever the adventurer, got epically low and only Jeff’s thermal finding sense prevented him from bombing out in an awkward locality (grapevines aren’t at all ideal!).

We regrouped and flew back to Geary’s, where the wind had swung to a crazy southerly. Dave blew it off and snuck over to the South tip. Jeff hung around for a bit trying to bust over power lines, while my XT didn’t have the speed to even make it to Geary’s, so I bombed out just North of Geary’s.

Dave, yet again, disappeared unnervingly low over the ridge trees into the horizon, while Jeff was still attempting a bust over the south tip. Jeff paid his respects to the ever elusive weather, and came and joined me on the ground.

Meanwhile, Dave was on the radio speaking of albino kangaroos and humping eagles. Bemused, Jeff and I legged it up to Geary’s and watched Dave come back and do a fantastic top landing. A catch up with some of Jeff’s delicious chocolate chip cookies, and we were calling it another awesome arvo at Lake George. Possibly the last of the season, but I’m hanging out for more.

JP is back in town and loving the flying…

First real flight back in Canberra for the year, Dave, the Thief and myself were out on Sun, 19 Apr 09, for a fly. A strong (cold!) wind made my first launch for the year something to bite into. 20 mins of ridge-soaring led to a massive thermal taking the team up past 2500 feet.

After a month long holiday in Darwin, and then down to RAAF Tindal for a temporary posting with the RAAF (where I luckily scored a backseat ride in a Hornet – bloody awesome!), I was back in Canberra for some more hectic flying.

We started out at Geary’s, but the wind was too light and south. We made the D to head up to North Launch, where we found the wind colder, stronger and more up the face. Ed and Pete later joined in the fun. Andrew launched and soared around for a bit. I was next, followed by Dave. The strong (cold!) wind made for a tricky launch.

We hung around for a bit, but the Sun wasn’t strong enough to trigger any real thermal activity. It was reading about 19⁰C. The clouds cleared a bit, and soon we were hit by an epic thermal which took us all the way up to cloud base. It was the first time I had been over 1000 feet, so I was stoked. But it didn’t stop at 1000 feet – I topped at cloud base at about 2500 feet. 10⁰C at this height had me wishing I had worn gloves.

Dave followed the thermal back over the ridge and a little while later he was out of sight. I played a bit around some clouds and rain, then left the cold heights to join Andrew at a warmer bomb out. The last I heard of Dave was that he was 5000 feet above Gunning and looking for more.

Andrew went and picked up Dave 65km down the track. Dave alleges he could have gone further, but apparently a mountain was in the way. Far out Dave. It’s just a mountain!

All up an amazing flight. As a new pilot I’m really starting to like thermals!

JP

… and sends a pic

This a photo from the Thursday before Easter over Parkes. We ended up doing a 100km triangle that day Forbes-Parkes-Bogan Gate-Forbes.

Phil Schroder

Andrew “The Thief” Luton tells us about he weekend

Well another great Easter weekend of flying was had for another year despite the anoos weather that we were thrown and despite the epic forecast that was given leading up to the weekend. I arrived at Forbes on Thursday night with a mate who had come along to retrieve drive for us for Friday and Saturday. On the Thursday night I decided to close my tent off completely as I had a feeling that the clouds were looking a little nasty and was greeted to rain as I awoke. Lucky I didn’t sleep with just the fly open!

My mate and I arrive out at the airport at 0830 and we set my glider up in the hanger as it was still drizzling outside. After a while I had had enough of waiting and said to Steve lets go for a tow to which he said OK. When we took off it was hardly raining but not long into the tow it started raining again and I stayed on for as long as I could. The second I pinged off and slowed the glider to a normal flying speed with full VG the glider instantly stalled and the nose fell without warning. This was no problem as it simply meant that I had to fly a little faster to maintain nice controlled flight. I did a few experimentations with slowing the glider with and without VG as well as turning to see how the glider would react. Once I was comfortable with the different control that I had due to the wing being heavier due to the rain I flew around just to the north of the airport waiting for Steve to race down to grab my mate who then came up in the Dragon Fly to take some video before I had to come into land, to which we got some good vids! Some might think that spending money on a tow when there is no lift is pointless but I found it very useful as I had never flown my wing when it had been completely wet and now have an understanding of what to expect if I get caught out one day.

Later that arvo the rain cleared and everyone was hanging around the hanger walking around aimlessly working out what to do. I went to Steve and said how much for a tow to 200-300 ft? He said if everyone was keen $5. So with that I got everyone keen enough to set up and with that a spot landing comp was on. This was great fun with everyone having 3 or 4 tows. The landings were hot some screaming in from a distance in ground effect and others flaring high to hit the spot. Dave managed to pull off a very nice HIGH flare which is on film and I will do my best to get it on the Tube soon.

Saturday came around and the cu’s were looking great. We were ready to tow by about 12 by which point the cu’s had grown and a storm had built to the North. Trent towed first and managed to slowly climb away as per usual J. Dave and I towed next but both didn’t manage to grab any usable lift, the only lift I got was 2 turns in zeros on my final approach!!! Dave towed again and managed to get away and just as I was thinking about going again I could see it was raining heavily half a km to the north and closing in fast so put my glider in the hanger and went on retrieve duties as my mate had gone home due to the weather which was a fair call!

The goal for today was Temora, as apparently their was an air show on J. Dave landed 20km down the road from Forbes not managing to outrun the storm in time. When I got to him he was standing near a tree with everything packed up enjoying the heavy shower that he was receiving. I stayed in the car as he tied the glider on the roof. As he was finishing tying the glider the back roof rack I saw him drop to the ground as a lightning bolt hit the fence about 20m from him. There was no delay what so ever with the thunder clap which confirmed that it was a close call. I thought he might have been affected by the bolt but just as I was about to open the car door to check if he was all good the cheeky bugger jumps back up and jumps in the car. Once in the car Dave explained that he had let go of the car at the split second the lightning bolt hit and that he heard a crackling noise a split second before the bolt hit and reacted in letting go of the car to fall to the ground as he though the car was going to cop it! The noise he heard was the electric charge building up just before the lightning struck. Amazing stuff!

Dave and I then went on retrieve for T-man who was still in the air and ahead of the storm. He ended up landed 18km short of goal after flying 106km. We got to him about a minute after he landed and helped him pack up before a wind gust came thorough bring a wall of dirt. Again, another top event for the day. The trip back to Forbes was greeted with a large amount of humour as we received a call from Tumut to hear that a punter had landed on a car in style! This is without a doubt definitely up for the clubs monthly fark award next month!

When we got back to the airfield the storms had cleared and left a large amount of low cloud around and calm air. A number of people were still at the airfield and Steve was towing Nicola up. Right I thought time to grab some more video footage. I taped my camera to my base bar and up we went above the clouds! This flight was absolutely magic. I pinged off just above the cloud layer and got some great footage of the Dragon Fly flying around in the sun above the clouds.

Sunday came and the cu’s looked gold. Base was low starting off at about 1800agl. This lifted by the afternoon to nearly 4000agl. Trent, Dave and Barnsey made goal Munjal 55km down the road. Dave towed first and headed off for Munjal with Barnsey and myself next in line for tow. The climbs were amazingly light, the lightest I have ever been in. I released from tow right on 2000ft agl and cored a thermal with Barnsey climbing initially at 70-100ft/min. Trent joined us off tow a little lower than us just as the thermal came to a pause. We all then bolted over to the NW about 2km away where there was a nice cloud forming. Barnsey got there first and I came in just under him with the climb rate of around 150-200ft/min which got stronger near closer to the cloud peaking somewhere just over 300ft/min. Trent came in way under me and from where I was it didn’t look like he had glide back to the airport if he didn’t get the climb. As Trent tends to do he climbed up from low and met us at cloud base (top job Trent). Trent and Barnsey decided to head off for Munjal in chase of Dave while I made the call to stay within glide of the airport as I was off home that evening back to the missus (a hard priority but after 3 days hanging out with the boys it was an easy decision hehe). The cloud that Trent, Barnsey and myself had climbed up in was quite large by the time we got there and I kept climbing up in the middle of it and then flying out to the side loosing height and then flying back in again. I managed to do this for about 30 min which was pretty cool to say the least before the climb ceased. After and hour and a half of playing I came in over the airport and after a few wingovers to loose some height in style I landed and headed home.

This was a top weekend even though the flights were not the typical crazy good Forbes type but I feel that I learnt a hell of a lot out of it. Many thanks once again to Steve for coming out and towing us up and having many laughs – It’s always a pleasure flying with you. For those of you thinking about coming out to the next Forbes weekend all I can say is that if you have a hang glider and an aerotow endorsement you are silly not to be there!

Happy Flying – Thief >:-)

Just like offer a special note of thanks to Steve for hosting the Easter weekend at Forbes. His boundless enthusiasm and willingness to just ‘get out there and do it’ was instrumental in keeping us motivated despite pretty average weather conditions.

Have a look at this picture to see the conditions on Sunday morning. 

This is how things changed later in the day.

Goes to show, never write the day off too soon…. Thanks for the nice tow above cloudbase, Steve. 

Thanks also to the folk from the aeroclub. They are a friendly bunch who made us very welcome.

Certainly hope to do it again soon.

Cheers,

David “Millman” Phillips