With the wind forecasted to be southwest we (Mark Bolt and I) were looking
forward to heading up the Michigan thumb to Port Hope on Lake Huron. Mark had
always wanted to do this flight (he lives in Pontiac, Michigan) and now with
Belinda chasing he had the opportunity.
The ETA forecast the day before had been for cu's at 5,000' MSL (the ground
elevation here is 900'), but the RUC on Sunday called for a blue day, like the
day before. The ETA has been consistently calling for clouds up here while the
RUC on the next day shows no clouds.
Cu's or not I committed to launching around 1 PM, and around 12:30 we started
getting little cu's. The inversion was well defined, and there was so much
moisture in the air that the haze was thick and the visibility was ten miles or
less. The cu's were forming right at the top of the inversion. They were mere
wisps.
I was off first and found good lift to 5,700' while I waited for Mark. I figured
we would fly together and that would make the retrieval that much easier.
The idea was to go east north east around the south side of the Flint class C
airspace, then head north north east to Port Hope, 118 miles away. The problem
was that the wind was south southwest (200 degrees) instead of southwest at 225
as I had expected. The clouds looked better to the north also, but after some
discussion we felt that the day was good enough to get us around the airspace to
the south.
It would have been possible to go up the west side of the Flint airspace and
then go northeast toward Port Hope. All in all I wish now that we had made that
effort.
The clouds quickly died as we headed east. We heard later that they also died
over Cloud 9 about forty five minutes after we left, so maybe it didn't matter
that we headed cross wind or not. Without clouds it was a crap shoot. You just
flew along and hoped that you stumbled into the lift.
There were few obvious thermal sources below. I looked for dry fields and gravel
pits hoping for hotter ground spots than the lakes and forests.
I had to keep heading east to get under the airspace centered at Flint. Flying
over Fenton I was low working up from 1,100' AGL and drifted to the north
northeast about a quarter mile into the airspace (which is why I made sure that
the flight wasn't validated on the HOLC). I had thought that 10 nautical miles
was 11 miles, and stayed 11.25 miles away from the center of the airspace, but
when I got back and checked the airspace circle was 11.5 miles.
When I got around the airspace the clouds were almost all gone. After a good
climb over a fair I took an eleven mile glide to land 50 miles out from Cloud 9.
About half an hour later we guided Mark into a landing in the same field.
Tracy Tillman, always the engineer and looking for continuous improvement,
thought that there could be an improvement of the wheels that come with the
Wills Wing wheel brackets. He has had good success over the last few years with
a modification that allows for thicker, rounded, and somewhat bigger wheels to
mounted on to the Wills Wing brackets. After a bit of drilling and machining of
the brackets, he is able to flip around the two wheel brackets to allow the
bigger wheels to be used. Here's what they look like:
The thicker, rounded wheels can handle softer ground and longer grass than the
smaller, thinner white wheels, and allow for some sliding on the ground if they
experience a side load. They also provide for a bit more clearance of the
pilot's fingers over the ground, when holding on to the basetube. They have been
well-tested by pilots at Cloud 9 Field and elsewhere on Falcons, Sport 2's, U2's
and Talons.
Tracy is thinking about selling the modified wheel sets for those who want this
extra level of safety. Contact him for more information.
We have a Sport Class in the USHGA Competition scene. Should Sport
Class pilots earn NTSS points? Should they have separate tasks from the Flex
Wing Race Class?
#1 - If you're feeling at all queasy, dizzy, or uncomfortable -
tell me! There's nothing embarrassing about it. Flying, especially this way,
is an experience completely different than anything our species has evolved
for. I'll make the flying as smooth as possible. If it's on the way up, we can
get off the tow line any time we'd like and do a nice glide to landing. It's
better to enjoy a slightly shorter flight than be really, really miserable and
not learn anything anyway. The smoothest way down is a nice relaxing leisurely
flight and we can always do it again.
#2 - Look around at the horizon, and enjoy all the fresh air (there's lots of
that! :-) ). Motion sickness is usually
caused by our eyes telling us something different than the balance centers in
our ears are telling us. In something like a car or a boat our eyes tell us
that we're not moving because the dashboard in front of us isn't moving much in
our field of view, but our balance centers are telling us that we're getting
bounced around and aren't level & such. Our brains decide that since our visual
and orientation sensors are giving us conflicting inputs, we must've eaten a bad
mushroom and had better hurl.
#3 - Don't admit to yourself that you're going to be sick, because if you do,
you will. Don't say to yourself "Ohhhh, I'm gona hurl" or focus on feelings in
your guts. Look at the awesome view and all the cool stuff you can see, and
remind yourself that it's not that bad and you're tell yourself that you're
enjoying it and are feeling more settled every minute, and everything's cool.
#4 - Lean over to the side!! If you puke on your tandem pilot, he'll activate
any one of the many, many Emergency Passenger Releases (point out a bunch of
assorted buckles, handles and releases :-)
) and you'll get to enjoy skydiving as well. If you're blowing chunks out to
the side it's not a problem and I like to circle over top of the spectators so
that they can have the fun of making words out of the Alphaghetti that's raining
out of the sky, and you can play a game of "When The Hell Did I Eat THAT?!?"
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The Oz Report, a near-daily, world wide hang gliding news ezine, with reports on competitions, pilot rankings, political issues, fly-ins, the latest technology, ultralight sailplanes, reader feedback and anything else from within the global HG community worthy of coverage. Hang gliding, paragliding, hang gliders, paragliders, aerotowing, hang glide, paraglide, platform towing, competitions, fly-ins. Hang gliding and paragliding news from around the world, by Davis Straub.
