Saturday’s forecast was obviously on people’s radar all week due to the number of members who turned up early to put their names on the flying list. Even arriving at 08:00 didn’t guarantee you a spot at the top!
Duty Instructor Simon Leeson gave a daily brief to a full clubhouse before setting up the field for the NW wind. With the cool wind and the sun making a welcome appearance the good temperature separation gave some stunning thermals from early on, through to the end of the day.
With a large number of members requiring currency flights and card checks as well as training Simon and various instructors managed to get almost everyone flown. Most flights were extended with the strong thermals and cloud streets as far as you could see. Once established it was easy to stay up with a few flights getting called down for others to fly. Good job we had all the club fleet available and it was great to see an empty hangar and at times and empty launch point.
We welcomed a visitor ex-CFI Colin Watt catching up with some of the senior members.
Pete Startup 230, Dan Hender JDP and Eric Alston G29 all flew their own gliders. 230 completed a Club 100 Tiverton – Crewkerne and then attempted to make Barnstaple but it was in the blue. JDP completed South Molton – Axminster – Mudford Gate for 176km.
With everyone flown the gliders were all washed and packed away before 17:45, by which time the temperature had dropped and all were glad to retreat to the clubhouse. – Mark Layton
