Oz Report

Dalby Big Air - day 4

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A task with winds in various directions, but mostly downwind, even after a big turn (Dalby Airport)

The results are here: http://www.soaringspot.com/2008dba/.

I was off to Toowoomba for an MRI scan on my knee, but the sky looked great all day.  The task started earlier with the start window opening at 1 PM.  The task was a 124 km dogleg to the northwest and then to the west.  Fortunately the winds cooperated and appeared to have been between 86 and 109 degrees, with more easterly winds on the westerly leg and more east south easterly winds on the northwest leg.  Very convenient.

Dave Seib won the day but he did it with his lowest save ever, he says.  His track log shows him down to 270' AGL with a 19 mph wind out of the east.  That must have been exciting.  It took him over five minutes to get out of that circumstance.

Cameron Tunbridge is leading the competition and came in second today.  Eight pilots made goal.  All of Leroy's students went cross country.

The sky was full of cu's all day.  Cloud base was over seven thousand feet.  It's pretty much all flat here sloping down to the west (the Darling Downs, this is).  It's easy to land around here as there are so many cultivated fields and lots of roads in all sorts of directions.

The town is busy with all the motels full of workers, working on a new power plant and an ethanol plant.  The Australian economy is going full steam a head and the bankers are trying to cool it down with 7.5% interest rates.

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Point of the mountain to be upgraded

The parks department perhaps fixing the erosion problems (POM, Draper, Utah, USA)

http://www.ksl.com/?nid=148&sid=2832649

"The plan recommends some physical changes over the next few years to upgrade park facilities.  Stucki said, "The big physical things will probably be the parking areas, the bathroom facilities, maybe some facilities for some camping.  We'd like to get some native grasses back out here, and also a little bit of the erosion problems, to be able to solve some of them.  We have some safety hazards with some of the erosion that's occurred out here that needs to be fixed."

Thanks to Jeff O'Brien who writes:

Good things are happening at the Point of the Mountain to secure both the north and south sides as county or state parks.  Dave Rosner and Kevin Koonce, two Kitty Hawk transplants happened to be out flying when the news crew showed up with a state park ranger.  A very favorable news clip.

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Be Prepared

Life comes at you pretty fast (Ingolstadt, Bavaria, Germany)

Walter Trost <walter.trost> sends:

With this hang gliding scenery a local car dealer is trying to convince his customers of having their cars checked - his slogan: Because a good preparation is essential.

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Using thermals under water

Thermal driven underwater glider (WoodsHole, MA)

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2008-02/whoi-rgn020708.php

Though the thermal glider is not the first autonomous underwater vehicle to traverse great distances or stay at sea for long periods, it is the first to do so with green energy.  Most gliders rely on battery-powered motors and mechanical pumps to move ballast water or oil from inside the vehicle’s pressure hull to outside.  The idea is to increase or decrease the displacement (volume) of the glider without changing its mass.

The new thermal glider draws its energy for propulsion from the differences in temperature—thermal stratification—between warm surface waters and colder, deeper layers of the ocean.  The heat content of the ocean warms wax-filled tubes inside the engine.  The expansion of the warming wax converts heat to mechanical energy, which is stored and used to push oil from a bladder inside the vehicle’s hull to one outside, changing its buoyancy.  Cooling of the wax at depth completes the cycle.

Thanks to Leonard, Scott R NAE <Scott.R.Leonard>.

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