My weather analysis for the weekend was going like this:
- Rain? No. - Check
- Wind? Under 10mph from surface to 6K. - Check
- Is Rhett towing? Yes. - Check.
Tanner-Hiller it is. I love flying there, and wish more of my XC-aspiring flying friends would come here and play with me.
If I checked forecast in more detail, I would see that it was a high pressure day. Several times already, I had great flying experience at Tanner-Hiller when high pressure was rolling through.
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Jeff Curtis also posted that he was going. Sounded like we could get ourselves a cross country party after all.
The forecast was calling for a late day. I wasn't in a hurry to get anywhere early, and rolled in to the airport around 11am. A couple of pilots were already launching... and landing soon after. The day hasn't switched on, yet.
Jeff showed up soon after. We got our gliders assembled, inspected, cameras and varios mounted. Nick Caci, Jeff, John Beckley, and I had a brief discussion on where we could fly on this sunny day. Wind was from the north, and it was supposed to switch to east toward 5pm. It was around 5 miles per hour, so a triangle was possible - easy retrieval. Or a flight to the coast - somewhere between New Heaven and New London in Connecticut.
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| Not a cloud in the sky |
Ok, I thought, I got this. Quabbin Reservoir is to the west, Worcester is to the east, I should start flying downwind, which is south... That is.. um, um, ... keep Quabbin to my right.... Got it.
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| Tiny clouds in otherwise empty sky |
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| Noel assisting Doug on launch |
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| Captain Rhett |
Around 1PM, Doug Brown and Nick Caci launched and skyed out, even though there were almost no clouds. Okey-dokey - time to fly away.
Jeff launched first, then another pilot, then me. It was a pretty bumpy tow. Good. Thermals were there. Rhett started to circle in one around 2000' AGL. I didn't pin off. I have never pinned off without a pilot waving me off before. Rhett was making rather tight turns. He would tell me when, I figured. Keep going. Then Rhett done the same a minute later around 2500' AGL. I could feel the thermal bouncing the tug, and then me. Rhett was making a tight turn again. "Is he telling me something", I though. I knew the thermal was there. It was time to boost my confidence level - I pinned off without Rhett actually waving me off. Thank you, Rhett, for another lesson.
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| Takeoff |
The thermal was indeed a yummy one. It took me to 5K without much trouble. What about XC now? I wasn't sure. A bit too low. Plus, I was north-east of the airport, but all cummies were closer to Quabbin reservoir, on the west side of the airport. I saw Jeff circling a few miles away, much farther to SW. Hm... let me get another thermal and then I'll think about XC.
I set on a glide toward actual clouds. A mile or so on the other side of the airport, I got another climb. I couldn't center on it, no matter how hard I tried. I kept losing it, making wider circle, finding it again. On average, I was still climbing, though. Not a relaxing exercise.
Finally, around 6K MSL, I gave up on this thermal. It was going up and down, like I was at the very top. I was still not sure about XC. I asked Jeff where he was. He was a mile south of me. Sometimes, I could see his glider against the sky. Maybe I could get closer to his position? I set on another glide, going SW where some better clouds were.
Two minutes later, I flew right into 500 FPM sink. Then 700. As far as I could tell I was under a cloud, but it wasn't pulling me in. I turned 90 degrees to get away from the sinking course, and get under another cloud while I still could.
I lost half of the altitude. My XC ambitions were waning, too. But just as I was about to turn back upwind, toward the airport, my vario stopped crying. Happy beeps! Very soon they turned into very happy beeps. I was going up 700 FPM. Now we are talking!
Around 7K MSL, My XC mood came back, and I asked Jeff about his plans. Jeff replied that he was at 6500' MSL and ready for some XC. Great! I was approaching 8K, and I was going, too.
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I could not see Jeff's glider anymore, and tried to get a fix on his location from the description he was giving on the radio. It worked somewhat. He was flying down the river. I could see the markers he was describing, but I never could get a visual on his glider. His new wing is simply invisible.
In my last climb, I started to get close to the cloudbase. I left the thermal, and sped up toward the edge of the cloud. Still climbing, eventually topping out at 8600' MSL. My personal best! I was slightly underdressed for the altitude, especially summer gloves didn't do anything against 40F, 30mph airflow. A few minutes later, after losing a couple of thousands feet, I was back in much warmer air.
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| Racing from under the cloud |
I was on a glide for 15 minutes. That is when you realize how really slow a hang glider is. All your reference points are moving so slowly, and at the end of it, I covered just 5-6 miles.
I got over Ware with 3800' to spare. I saw a race track south of the town. I also picked a few fields to land in. I got into a weak climb, and for a moment thought I got this. What happened next was a combination of distracted flying, poor observation, and bad decision making. While I was slowly climbing, I asked Jeff where he was. Jeff was very low over a racetrack. Probably 1500' AGL. He was busy working a climb. I could see the racetrack with cars going round and round. So when my climb from weak became non-existent, I set on a glide toward the track.
The problem was I still couldn't see Jeff's glider, and trying to locate him was taking some processing power. I was distracted. Then I hit significant sink on the way to the race track, instead of continue going through that, I turned around trying to get back to the climb I had.
Reviewing the flight tracks later on, I never actually made it back to the thermal. I started searching around erratically, and missed it completely... again.
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| Why is it not working? |
Nothing was working, and I was in landing mode a few minutes later.
Then there was a bit of excitement on landing. I picked a big field this time. When I got 400' over it, I realized that the field was a landfill, a dom sort of thing. Some vent pipes sticking out of the ground. Plenty of space between the pipes, but going long on this field would be deadly. I modified my approach, made an S-turn to lose more altitude, and turned on final much closer to the ground than I prefer. It worked out. I landed with plenty of distance from the slopping down edge of the field.
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| Big field this time |
I landed ok. Not a perfect non-stepper, but safe on the ground. And of course, I was behind a tall wire fence, with gates closed.
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| Enjoying the fenced view |
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| Fenced |
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| At the gate |
I walked my glider to the gate, broke it down and called Dana. He just landed back at the airport. He didn't go XC with us as his radio wasn't working. He didn't know what we were up to.
Dana drove my truck, and picked me up. He helped me to get the glider over the fence, too. Thank you, man! I owe you one.
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When I landed, I heard from Jeff that he saw me land. After that I had zero contact with him. Two hours later, as I was about to start worry, he texted me that he landed somewhere in Connecticut. 34 miles away. Bastard! ... I mean, congratulations, Jeff! Awesome flight.
Since I was already back at the airport, I took Jeff's car, and drove to Connecticut to pick him up. Took one hour each way.
Overall, not a bad day. Not a bad day at all.
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Forecast for West Rutland was very good for the next day, so after Jeff brought me back to the airport, I drove to MFP to join the flying party.
West Rutland ended up being awesome. More on that some other time ...
Flights: 1, Time: 1:20
Flight recording:
A short video:
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