Hong Kong Saturday

05-Jul-14

8:30 am ... Getting ready for a big Air Experience Flight day and not a cloud in the sky.

The original phone enquiry taken by Garrett Russell on June 17th resulted in the sale of a single pre-paid AEF voucher for Kam Li who was keen to try gliding while holidaying in Australia. That was followed by a call from Ming Lam on June 28th who purchased another five! By the time the big day arrived we had confirmed that we could also accommodate another 4 passengers to make it a total of 10 AEF passengers for the day.       

All we needed now was flyable weather and an adequate ground crew.   

On the trip up from Brisbane this morning, the further north I travelled, the more signs of overnight rain appeared. Upon arrival there were pools of groundwater at the gate and around the hangars. It was already obvious however that the wind was drying out the airfield and surrounds nicely.    

The originally rostered duty crew was Dave Donald, Karl Bodi, Steve Chapman, Dan Kershaw and Lehi Reeves. Dave reported in sick with the flu during the week (being unable to fly he generously offered to make the trip to YCAB to assist with ground duties ... he was however politely asked to stay away!). We received an early morning email from Dan Kershaw re illness at home (we trust that has all turned out OK Dan), and we did not see or hear from Lehi Reeves (are you out there in cyberspace somewhere Lehi? ... if so please give us a call).   

David Higgs, Kevin Rodda and John Nestor had put their hands up during the week to assist when Garrett had confirmed that he had a family commitment to attend to (John is a Friday Crew regular and doesn't normally fly on weekends ... his trip to YCAB specifically to help us today was invaluable!). Rupert Perry was there to help early in the day and returned for a flight and to help pack up later in the day. Jacob Mason turned up early to do some personal flying but unselfishly jumped in to give us a very welcome hand at the flight line. In the early afternoon Wayne Burgess arrived to also give us a hand.         

Our guests arrived as we were in the process of moving from the tie-down area to RWY12 where we set up operations for the day. In order of flights taken, they were Kam Li, Sai Ho Wong, Anson Lau, Mei Fong Chan,  Jacky Wong, Eddie Kwan, Noddy Fung, Ming Lam, Bobby Chan, and Samuel Lai. 

We established the flight line in time for a "passenger welcome/briefing" and first launch at 10:07 am (by making use of the gazebo to allow us to leave the ailing pie-cart at the tie-down area). The prevailing brisk wind was clearly straight into our faces but that didn't prevent us from having to be extra cautious early in the day as we faced powered aircraft coming straight at us from RWY30!

All ten AEF passengers are involved in power flying in Hong Kong and were keen to experience gliding. They were appreciative of the hospitality shown to them and there was even some discussion after their flights were concluded of the possibility of a week-long gliding visit to Caboolture some time in the future.  

The 10 passenger flights were completed by 1:20 pm (2 x 3500 ft and 8 x 3000 ft launches). Unfortunately the morning sky was virtually bereft of lift and the result was ten flights ranging in duration from 16 to 23 minutes.     

Our friends from Hong Kong thoroughly enjoyed their morning with us at YCAB ... mainly due to the unselfish efforts of Jacob Mason and John Nestor sharing the Duty Pilot and Retrieve Car duties while David Higgs, Karl Bodi and I took the passenger flights. A big thank you also to Steve Chapman in the tug!    

Three member flights completed the day's operations in a sky that started to present some lift with all three landing on RWY24 near the tie-down area ... Wayne Burgess and Karl Bodi in CQC with the flight of the day at an excellent 1hr 1min (Wayne claimed that this was only achieved because he managed to keep Karl off the controls) ... Jacob Mason and David Higgs with a 14 min check flight in GXQ ... and Rupert Perry sharing a 37 min last flight of the day with John Nestor in CQC).       

The day's statistics: 

GXQ - 3 flights for 50 minutes