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Rope-break Saturday |
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08-Dec-12 |
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| Duty
Crew: Barry McCarthy (Duty Instructor), Mark
Thompson (Instructor), Steve Chapman (Tug Pilot),
Rod Wilson (Air Experience Instructor) and Rod
Elsworth (Duty Pilot). |
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| There
was a total of 14 flights ... including a REAL rope
break and an Air Experience passenger (in the same
flight) as well as three long solo flights in single
seaters (almost 3 hours for Bernard
"Speedy" Gonsalves in his Schleicher Ka6,
nearly 2 hours for me in my Schweizer 1-35 and
approaching 2 hours for Chris Weir in the Club
Libelle). |
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| 2
flights in GJY (2:11), 6 flights in GKY (2:33), 4
flights in CQC (1:28), 1 flight in GSR (2:58) and 1
flight in WUC (1:56). |
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Peter
Jacobs with Mark Thompson |
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| Barry
McCarthy and Mark Thompson were kept busy taking
training/check flights with Lehi Reeves, Peter
Jacobs, Vince Everett, Mark Yabsley and Rod
Elsworth. |
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Mark
Yabsley - a welcome face back at the flight line. |
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Marty
Kavanagh and Rod Wilson |
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| Rod
Wilson's friend Marty deserved to have his pic taken
... firstly by admitting to being a friend of Rod's
and secondly for being keen to take a flight with
him! |
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| And
about that rope break ... I did some research at the
late afternoon de-briefing (held at McCafe) and
established that neither Speedy, Steve Chapman or I
have ever seen or heard of a rope break on an
aero-tow launch. At the risk of introducing inadmissible
hearsay evidence ... I must report that Speedy also
mentioned that Bert Persson had said recently that
he has never seen one. |
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| Well
it happened today when Rod was 2,500 feet into the
3,500 launch of our only Air Experience flight ...
the passenger's reaction ... "does this
normally happen?". |
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| Rod
recovered well however and delivered a 39 minute
ride for our passenger. |
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| Note
to Tug Master ... tost rings and garden hose
retrieved. |
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Speedy
Gonsalves and Vince Everett contemplating what might
be. |
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That's
Speedy's Ka6 in the background ... at the flight
line for the first time in quite a while. |
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| It
was great to see Vince back at the airfield and
flying again after an unfortunate saga
of knee replacements, infections and re-replacements
over the last couple of years. It was a great
pleasure to have Vince "ride shotgun" from
the front seat for me when I took a short hangar
flight in CQC at the end of the day. |
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Barry
McCarthy ... leading by example in the prevention of
skin cancer.
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Whilst there was good
lift to be found, it was spasmodically quite rough
in the rising air and it wasn't a simple exercise to
stay in and utilise it.
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In Speedy's words ...
"there was something wind-sheary happening up
there today".
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The conversation of
the day (at McCafe) ... Steve Chapman (tongue
in check) to Speedy: "the only thing wrong
with SPA now is the the fabric work on the elevators...
Speedy's reply (with
a wry Smile): "I'll have to make a note of
that for when we re-skin your Arrow".
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Kevin Rodda,
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for the Duty
Crew
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