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Dawn
breaks on Brisbane's Northside this morning.
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After a
glorious dawn, silky smooth air surrounded the
airfield for the duration of our gliding operations at
Caboolture today.
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On hand
when I arrived were Peter Stephenson (Duty
Instructor), Mike Grady (Tug Pilot), Tony Sorensen (to
lend a hand) and Chris Weir (eager to give the Club
Libelle a run).
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I
was there as the rostered Air Experience Instructor
and also covered for the "missing" Duty
Pilot (who did not turn up and did not let us know).
We set up operations at RWY30 with the Libelle and the
Twin Astir where we camped all
day.
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Ready
at the RWY30 flight line with the Twin Astir (IKW),
the Club Libelle (GJY) and the Piper Pawnee tug (SPA).
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Chris
Weir piloted the Libelle for the first two flights of
the day returning a 26 minute flight from 3500ft and a
27 minute flight from 3400ft.
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As I
left the airfield yesterday, I caught up with
Caboolture Aero Club's Peter Pretorius at the gate and
asked him when he would be sharing a flight in a
glider with me again. We
then realised that we would both be at the airfield
around 8.00 am this morning and made a tentative
"date" for Peter and I to fly together again
today.
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My
mid-morning phone message left on Peter's unanswered
mobile resulted in a texted response ... "ETA 15
minutes" ... which left me thinking that he was
at his hangar and would be at the flight line soon.
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It
wasn't until we saw Peter's yellow Wittman Tailwind in
landing circuit that we realised he had been out
flying early ... and it wasn't until we saw him
approaching the piecart with a passenger on his trike
that we realised he had been sharing an early morning
flight with Elita Huynh (an Aviation student at
Griffith University who he had met at a recent
"Women in Aviation" event at
YCAB).
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Peter
Pretorius and Elita Huynh.
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Peter
suggested that I take Elita for a flight in his place
(her first ever flight in a glider) ... so we ventured
off in the Twin Astir with little expectation of
finding lift other than a couple of wispy-looking
clouds trying their hardest to form over the
Caboolture
Showground.
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The
launch was silky smooth on tow until we felt a decent
bump and released in the blue just short of the
Showground clouds at 3300 feet. We managed to climb to
3500 feet twice ... however we soon descended to 3000ft
each time when we tried to push further west to
the 3500 feet step in the direction of the quarry near
the Caboolture Golf Club.
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Then,
back under the afore-mentioned wispy-looking clouds,
there was absolutely no lift ... and it was then a gradual descent through silky smooth air (all the way
back to 1000
feet to join crosswind for a landing circuit) that
made up the balance of our 30 minute
flight.
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Elita
Huynh, Peter Stephenson and Peter Pretorius.
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Peter
Stephenson was keen to show off his State of Origin
gear at the pie-cart (where we had by then been joined
by David Higgs).
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Mike
Grady, David Higgs, Chris Weir, Peter Stephenson and
Tony Sorensen.
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Garrett
Russell called in for a visit and also appeared to be
somewhat mesmerised by Peter's State of Origin
gear.
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Peter
Stephenson and Garrett Russell.
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