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Hangola November 11 & 12, 1998

beautiful day at Woodstock. Wind was really cranking when I arrived at 1:00, so no one was even thinking about launching yet. Finally, mid afternoon it backed off some, so the "early adopters" hit the sky. Tom McG, Mike Balk, and John Middleton all launched. John was testing Chuck's new UltraSport. They all got really high, and reported lots of wind at altitude. The rest of us decided to wait a while.

In the next cycle, Steve Kinsley, John McAllister, Matthew and I all jumped. I was in the air a few minutes past four. Air was smoother, and easier, but also with not as much lift as earlier. a little later, Sheila and Karen joined us in the sky.

I got 58 minutes, max of 650 over launch, and a very pleasant flight. Others will report on their day, including Tom n Mike, who landed to the north.

Thanks to Mark Cavanaugh for being out there to wire, drive, and clear brush in the slot. Also nice to meet Karen's sister and a friend.

Sorry to Adam, the new H2 from Winchester who had come over with Homer. He ended up not flying because it stayed a bit rowdy until so late in the day. His turn will come again.

Cragin

To Chuck, and anyone interested in upgrading to the Ultrasport, John didn't seem to have any trouble with penetration in the Ultrasport and he was above Tom, for the most part, in the strong winds. Mike Balk has an XC and Tom has an Xtralite. I've never flown my glider in strong air intentionally and I have no interest in flying in strong air. But it's nice to see that the Ultrasport can handle it if needed. I got an hour and a quarter (1300 over) and Karen got 20 minutes (400 over). We had lots of sitings of bald eagles playing in the slot yesterday but each time I was hooked into my glider and facing the wrong way. By the time I got out, they were gone. And again in the air, squeals of "ooh bald eagles right above launch!" Meanwhile, I'm over at the second finger to the North and by the time I get back to launch, they're gone. DAMN! DAMN! DAMN!

Again, big thanks to Mark Cavanaugh for coming out to help out, what a guy!

Matthew (I wanna see the bald eagles, of Karen and Matthew)

Decided to give new meaning to "floating holiday" and headed to Woodstock yesterday. After watching Mike, Tom and J. Middleton (flying Chuck's BEAUTIFUL new glider!) with strong winds and turbulence - things seemed to calm down and I finally launched a little after 4:00. I had my hands full 'till I was about 150' over. After that it smoothed out quite a bit but there were still punchy areas. If conditions allowed I was really hoping to go to the north and land out but I never got above 550' and then it wasn't consistent. The wind actually got stronger closer to sunset and while I wasn't having major problems penetrating it did take awhile to get from the first finger back to launch. The highlight of the day was when two bald eagles came within 10 or 15 feet of me - what an experience! Not sure of my stats - something like 45 minutes or an hour, approx. 550/600 over. It was great to meet Karen's sister and her sister's friend sounds like she's pretty interested in learning hg'ing. Maybe we'll see her soon.

Others there were Karen and Matthew, Mark Cavanaugh (generous (or bored?) enough to come out and drive), Mike Balk, Tom, Steve Kinsley, Craig, Homer and Adam and John Middleton.

Afterwards most of us headed to Strasburg Inn - great day!

Sheila

Well, another flying day, another ridge run. If you put Saturday and Wednesday together, I did the whole ridge. There was a very strong West cross that prevented us from going south - slow going, lots of sink, and my arms were still tired from Saturday (I know I'll get a lot of sympathy for that).

So after boating around in zero ground speed for a while (which is to say it was fairly strong. At times I recorded a 26mph wind at altitude, but usually it was about 15mph. After spending about 10 minutes getting to the bridge, it would only take a few 360's to get back to the ridge. I dove with wind and was able to get 66 mph ground speed! Breaking all local and state speed limits! Woo woo!) I decided to go to the North end and land (Yup most of that sentence was one big long parenthetical insertion (aren't they fun?).) Boated most of the way up at min sink, getting down to 700' over, traveling about 30mph ground speed. Some turbulence and lift greeted me before and a little after the reservoir, and by the time I was at Signal Knob, I was about 1000' over. Figuring that there would be a 'venturi' effect off the end of the ridge, I made sure I went out well in front of the ridge. While flying over the LZ, waiting to get down, I noticed at one point that while flying about 28mph, I was actually tracking backwards. "Hmm," I thought to myself, "This is interesting." Then about -500', I hit some turbulence. "Hmm," I thought to myself, "This is interesting." Pulling in and flying really fast, I was able to penetrate, and I was assuming that as I got lower, the velocity would drop. I was actually starting to progress into the field, and didn't want to eat up too much of the field, I decided to do a final 360. That 360 placed me into the middle of the field behind the one I was planning on landing in. "Hmm," I thought to myself, "This is interesting." (It's not so much that I didn't have a variety of thoughts, it is just easier to cut and paste them.) As I pulled in, slowly going forward, waiting for the velocity to drop, I thought to myself, "This will be fun." (See, quite the variety of thoughts going through my head.) Well the velocity did drop, I did move forward into the proper field, and I did a fine no-step, high wind landing.

To prevent concerns or criticism, there were no trees in my flight path, and I could easily have landed in the fields behind me if it became necessary.

-Michael Balk

Bob G, Brian H and me. It was Brian's birthday. He was maybe 6k over when he remembers that his drivers license expires on his birthday. If he can't get to the DMV and renew it before they close he has to go thru the whole gruesome drivers test and stand in line with pimpley faced kids! So he wangs it down, sprints up the mtn and roars off. Dunno if he made it or not.

Portions of the foregoing are true.

sled whack for me. Beautiful sunny day though.

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This page last updated November12 , 1998