Mass Landout!

Yesterday, they managed to do it - land out every single glider in the contest - and the icing on the cake was that about 45 out 49 in the 15 m class landed in Serbia.  There were previously problems getting crews across the border for retrieves and yesterday was no exception.

I landed in a field with 6 other gliders at 1820 and 6 hours later the crews arrived for the 60 km retrieve after spending over 2 hours at the border and navigating their way through the maze of poorly signed roads.  On the way home there was another 1.5 hour delay at the Serbian border as all the pilots had to wait in line and fill out paperwork to leave.

 The first three gliders in the field

The next three gliders behind me

To say that the tasks were over called again yesterday is a gross understatement.  The forecast weather was for 4-6 kts lift to about 5500 ft and cloud streets.  In reality it was 1-2 kt  to about 3000 ft and mostly blue.  My trace shows I averaged 1.3 kts for the flight for 41% of the time.  EDIT:  I just read on the Aussie blog that their open class pilot didn't fare any better yesterday, 1.1 kt average for 37% of the time!

The task was originally set at 360 km for the 15 m class going deep in to Serbia.  After the morning meeting, I asked the weatherman some questions about the mid-level cloud over Serbia and he said it should move out, but there was also 50 mm of rain in the area last night and the ground would be wet.  During the meeting, the Irish pilot, asked the CD why the 15 m class was being sent on a task to Serbia when the weather was obviously weaker in that sector.  The reply was that they thought it would be OK.  On the grid, a new task was issued to us I think, as a result of these two questions.  It was shortened to 330 km and moved a little further north from the wettest corner of Serbia.  This task changed probably shaved at least two hours off the retrieves!


We finally arrived home and were in bed just after 4 AM and fortunately, today is a rest day for the 15 m class.

As I was on tow and approaching release altitude, the clouds did not look much higher than 2000 ft,  After release I found that bases were 2200.  It took a long time for them to rise and by 2 pm they peaked at around 3300 AGL.  Shortly afterward, about 30 km into the task it went mostly blue with a few wisps marking what some might consider to be thermals!

When it took two hours to get to the first turnpoint 120 km away, I knew we now had a distance day on our hands and with the weak lift it was a gaggle day.

During the flight, I was able to keep with the gaggle which is both a blessing and problem all at the same time.  I am sure we had 25 gliders in the gaggle and typically they were working two thermals, usually with over-lapping circles.  Staying with the gaggle was the only way to go yesterday and netted me 915 points for the day.

Many thanks to Virginia and Joerg who endured the border, roads, and mosquitoes to get me back home on what has to be my most epic retrieve ever!