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Date:
Sun, Dec 15, 2013 at 7:45 PM
Subject:
Sunday 15 at Caboolture
To:
cgcmemlist@vicnet.net.au
Today
was the second last shopping Sunday before Christmas,
and that must be the reason the 15 above refers to the
date and not the number of flights. We launched close
to half that number for a small but enthusiastic and
very friendly group of members and guests.
First
on the scene was Tony Sorensen. He came out to attend
to some tug maintenance, only to find Bert Persson had
already attended to it, leaving Tony free to socialise
with duty pilot Alex Horvath, tuggie Mike Grady, and
the rest of the pie cart crowd.
First
launch just before 09:30 was the now familiar
Kookaburra GLM with proud owners Speedy Gonsalves and
Kevin Rodda aboard.
First
club glider launched was CQC and for those who know
Robert Hart it was, surprisingly, his first flight in
the 28!
Robert
is returning to instruct with CGC after many years in
the Darling Downs wilderness so the flight was
something of a familiarisation with both the aircraft
and how much suburbia has grown around YCAB since his
last regular flights here. He and I realised on the
tow that it was the first time we’d been together in
a glider since my ab initio week back in 2006.
It
was not a long tow. Robert released at 1500’ into a
thermal that soon had us a thousand feet higher and
soon after that heading north along the mass of
convective clouds to see if we could find the
Kookaburra Kids out somewhere beyond the 4500’ step.
The only reason we didn’t get there was an attack of
L2 responsibility which reminded me that Lindsay had
two AEF passengers booked, resulting in a circuit
entry under almost full air brakes.
Maybe
Robert should have used full air brakes: by the time
we got back Lindsay was already lining up in GYK for a
bit over half an hour with his first passenger. And
the only reason he came back in that time (again, air
brakes all the way) was to be almost on time for his
second passenger!
While
all that was going on Alan Graham took off in CQC for
his longest solo yet at Caboolture - very close to an
hour of thermalling close to cloud base, close to the
airspace ceiling and occasionally close to GLM as they
rounded out a bit above two hours of soaring fun in
what some refer to as a Dead Tree Glider*.
Although
the sea breeze kicked in early and energetically,
there was still some lift to be found as I launched in
CQC for two family/friend flights and Steve Bowtell
joined Speedy and (according to some) a Colony of
Termites* in GLM. At 38 and 28 minutes, those were the
last two flights before well-earned drinks from the
fridge at about 13:00.
8
flights from what was effectively a half day:
GYK
2 flights 0:56
CQC
4 flights 2:06
GLM
2 flights 2:31
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