Saturday 19th to Monday 21st November 2022
Posted: 21/11/2022 16:22
Saturday 19th. A light WNW'ly strengthened and backed to become a moderate ESE'ly on a day with a low overcast and occasional rain as a weak occluded front stalled over the east of the UK preventing any flying.
Sunday 20th. An Atlantic front crossed the UK overnight, its cloud clearing the site in the morning and allowing flying to commence off runway 24 around 1130 hrs as a light to moderate W'ly slowly backed into the WSW. 19 ATs were flown, 6 being for First Flight pupils, while some bits and pieces of weak wave and main bowl hill lift resulted in 4 flights exceeding 30 minutes, but nobody managed over an hour. Steve Thompson/Colin Troise in K21 JVZ topped the duration list with 42 minutes, the result of some weak wave 1 km east of Thirsk where they maintained 3,400' asl for a while before finding some more 3 km SE of Bagby at a lower altitude to further extend their flight. Sarah Stubbs in Astir DSU had 36 minutes, closely followed by Rob Bailey and his P2 who had 35 minutes in the DG1000, helped by a tow to 3,500', while Steve took the first First Flight pupil of the day for 34 minutes in the DG1000, again helped by a high tow, plus some bits and pieces of lift over Sutton village. While zero or reduced sink was mainly the order of the day at best, Paul Whitehead and the last First Flight pupil of the day managed a climb from 1200' QFE to 1700' QFE over Kilburn in their 25 minute flight in the DG1000. The majority of the day's flying was dual, but John and Amelia Forrester, the aforementioned Colin Troise and Sarah Stubbs all flew solo, John and Sarah in Astir DSU and Colin and Amelia in K21 JVZ.
Monday 21st. A light to moderate E'ly blew all day and while the site was initially clear under a high overcast with ground equipment taken out to runway 20 in anticipation of flying, the northern half was quickly affected by orographic cloud giving foggy conditions at ground level, so there was no flying.
This blog describes a snippet of life at the Yorkshire Gliding Club. Why not take a flight and try it yourself, or we can teach you to fly as a full club member.