Trial Run

I originally planned to practice with the team at Henson's Gap in Dunlap Tennessee for a few days before the Team Challenge. However the Tennessee forecast was plastered with images of pouring rain so the team decided to fly at Ellenville New York before heading further south.

I met Allen and Jim at the LZ. I talked with Dave H and Tony while Allen and Jim completed their waivers. (Dave was doing some sewing on his ATOS sail before he took off for Tennessee). We tossed their gliders on my truck and drove to launch.

It was lightly blowing in when we arrived. Moments later Dan and Doug arrived and offered to drive my truck back down to the LZ where they needed to pay their flight fees. Sweet.

Allen

Jim

The wind got progressively stronger as we setup gliders and chatted with the local pilots. I just zipped up the last zipper when someone launched and slowly climbed out. After deciding on a radio frequency, Jim and I suited up and headed to launch. (Allen suited up as well but wasn't happy with they way his harness impeded his run.) Jim had to wait for the wind to swing to a desirable direction before running down the slope and into the air. Jim was just maintaining in front of launch so I chatted with some pilots until Jim started climbing above launch. I ran off in nice conditions and also started my slow climb up.

Gliders flying around launch

Initially the air was flat with just a few small thermals mixed in. I floated above the top of the back ridge line and started searching for stronger areas of climb . Meanwhile more pilots were running off so we had a good sprinkling of thermal indicators along the ridge. Some breaks in the the overcast allowed the sun to produce some strong rowdy thermals that lasted about 20 minutes before they faded and we returned to the mellower weak thermals. This alternating pattern of strong rowdy thermals and gentle weak thermals continued through most of the afternoon.

At one point I had a large military transport plane passed 500 - 700 feet over my head. Needless to say I quickly heading away from the planes old path to avoid any sinking wake vortices. I also watched the commercial passenger jets flying along behind the ridge.

I also noted the trees starting to change color on the high ground.

I spent the afternoon flying around with probably 20 other pilots that decided that flying was more rewarding than work.  ;-)  I also got a chance to fly with some of my Team Challenge team mates which should help us.

Doug

Dan

After landing and packing away our gliders, we drove to southern Pennsylvania before stopping for sleep in our trucks before continuing south Friday morning.

Flights: 1, Duration 2:49