Monday 9th to Wednesday 11th October 2023
Posted: 12/10/2023 21:33
Monday 9th. A medium level overcast eventually broke up to sunny intervals around 1600 hrs, the moderate W'ly falling light as the day progressed. Early on, weak hill lift was available in the main bowl and there was even some weak thermal, these helping visitor Malcolm Guard to soar for 1:11 in his Ka6cr. The only other flight to exceed 30 minutes was by visitor Pat Fowler, who managed 35 minutes in his Astir CS, while the Falke spent 25 minutes doing touch and goes on runways 24 and 20..
Tuesday 10th. A light SSE'ly soon veered into the SSW and increased to moderate, generating hill and some weak wave lift that resulted in 9 flights of over 30 minutes from the 21 ATs flown from runway 24. Steve Thompson in his Ventus bt was the first to climb in the weak wave, getting to 4,700' asl just to the east of Thirsk. Returning to the main bowl, Steve climbed again to 4,000' asl before descending to soar in augmented hill lift at around 1,500 QFE before soaring the ridges and doing an O/R to Tontine. Surviving a low point of -100' QFE on his way back to site while crossing from the forward to the main ridge, Steve landed after 3:12. The other pilot to soar for >1 hr was Clive Swain in his Kestrel 19. Initially climbing to 3,500' asl over the main bowl, Clive visited High Paradise Farm, soared the main bowl at 7-800' QFE for a while before contacting the wave again there and climbing to 4,800' asl. An exploratory venture to the west didn't find any more wave and Clive landed after 3:38. Visitor Pat Fowler in his Astir CS on his second flight of the day, had 1:45, initially finding bits and pieces of lift over Kilburn before returning to the main bowl and climbing to 3,000' asl just before landing. The 3 longest flights of between 20 and 60 minutes were all in K21 JVZ with Craig Scott as P1. Flying with Duncan Pask, the pair had 47 minutes soaring at around 2.800-3,200' asl over the A19 just south of Bagby and then over the site, Craig and John Dore had 37 minutes maintaining 3,600-3,900' asl on a NNW/SSE 3 km long beat centred just to the NW of Sutton village, while Craig and visitor Neil Meakin had 53 minutes hill soaring the main bowl at 1.100' QFE for 53 minutes.
Wednesday 11th. A light to moderate NW'ly blew all day under cloudy skies, so operations were off runway 24 with landings on 24 or 20. Launches were a mixture of 3 via the winch and 4 via AT, none of the AT launches exceeding 30 minutes but the winch launches yielded 2 over an hour and one of 42 minutes. The 42 minute flight was by Clive Swain/visitor A Gorton, making use of main bowl hill lift to soar at around 6-800' QFE.. The longer flights saw visitors Malcolm Guard in his Ka6cr have 1:15 and Pat Fowler in his Astir CS have 1:09, both soaring the main bowl at around 500-750' QFE.
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.