Flying Report 26 Feb 22
With a full flying list and a number of visitors, much to everyone’s relief and at long last the weather played ball with both thermic activity and also wave for those who flew later in the day. During the day all were amazed by the volume of standing water evident in the floodplain of the Severn, particularly around Shrewsbury.
As forecast, we had a strong Southerly with a sporty cross wind component that picked up strength as the day progressed, to the extent that the two wood gliders were returned to Hangar 4. In the wind, flying off r’way 18 saw the glider at 500 feet over the threshold.
We were delighted to welcome a number of visitors from the Aston University together with two visitors from RAF Cosford and our aim was to fly them first…..
….and then turn our attention to our pilots in training for whom, it has to be said, conditions were challenging. It is to their credit that they all managed the conditions extremely well and we can already see some more solo pilots in the near future.
With a full flying list, many thanks go to our visiting instructors for helping out. Whilst Alan Jolly looked the part in a resplendent “jolly” hat, Nigel (Periway) Lassiter kept us engaged all day with, firstly a rope break on launch and, second, his always entertaining RT procedure. For his rope break efforts, incidentally it was quickly repaired by Nigel and Nick, he was awarded the Club Dumbo prize of the day.
Late in the day we found a Hawk lurking on the periway but decided that it was bit heavy for an aerotow - maybe a winch launch on a double black weak link!
Hog of the day went to Will Dean in R66. Flying later in the afternoon and taking an aero-tow to 3,500ft, Will took a strong climb into Wave and then on to 5,800ft for a flight that lasted 2hrs 25mins, in the process enjoying some super views that included the long closed (1947) airfield at Montford Bridge.
Lastly, we welcomed Cosford based visitors Martin and Lisa who joined us to fly today. We hope that you both enjoyed your trip and that we see you again in the not too distant future
