Today was definitely one of the days when everything seems to be working against you. Bad luck we call it, I guess. In fact can a flight that starts like this end successfully:
Yes, this is a tow plane! We call it Nemo the Fish. I towed behind it this morning and that was the beginning of my story.
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| this was when I went: "Holy crap! Seriously?" |
Nemo is supposed to have 300 horse power engine, 299 of these horses are constantly working to support its extraordinary aerodynamics, 1 miserable horse remains available for towing ;) Long story short: longest tow, dropped off with no gliders to mark the weak thermals, I struggled to stay up for half an hour. Survived that bit but it was about to get better.
After achieving unreal starting heights of ca. 4,000 ft I looked at the screen just to find that the LX was playing tricks on me for the very first time. I did what I could and finally had to restart the whole system, which solved the problem. I think Nemo managed to scare the crap out of the LX too ;)
So off we went with a group of few gliders. The first 60 km were kind of slow but steady. We managed to find climbs every now and then and then started getting low close to the river. Typical. The little gaggle spread around and everybody went off on their own ventures.
I haven't seen many gliders since then but what doing all right north of the river. Typical too. I went quite into the first sector and the second leg was uneventful either. I even managed to get up to 6500 ft - once! The rest was between 2,500 and 4,500 - low but steady.
Until I had to cross the river back and head towards home. 70 km out, ca. 2500 ft below glide ... I maxed out the height before crossing the river and went for it hoping to either find some markers there or just go for the usual trigger points. With no gliders in sight, I started checking out the known spots. Nothing there ... Down to 2,500 ft AGL (ca. 1,300 ft above the decision height for the engine) I headed for the piggery. Nope, not this time sunshine! I lined up with a landable paddock and went through the motions. The motor needed a while to realise what I want from it but 300 ft later it fired up and took me back home.
Of course I met one gaggle on the way back chaotically working on their final glides. It was too late for me though.
Dave is thinking about retrofitting his 29 with an engine. He asked me this morning how many times I've used the engine to avoid an outlanding. The answer was - once. I had to revise it this evening to: twice :).
Having this luxury allowed us to have dinner at usual time and get up the next morning without the need to rig the glider. I think it is worth every cent we've paid for it.
Here is the flight on the OLC:
It's also quite clear where this exercise puts me on the score board:
Not the best position with 7 days to go but ... life is not all about gliding, right Zig?
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| Zig and our own Waikerie tow pilot - Pete |
