Technical Inspection

Today there was high cirrus that kept the temperature down, but the weather man predicted lift under the cirrus.  After a lousy sleep last night I elected not to fly today, but instead went through the technical inspection.  Some did fly and were able to complete the practise task.

The inspection involves measuring the wing span of the glider to ensure that it conforms to the IGC class specification, checking the cockpit for cloud flying instruments and to ensure that all items such as PDA's are securely mounted.  After all of this is done, the glider is weighed in flying condition to check against the max allowable weight for your glider.  Each day on the way to the grid, all gliders will be weighed to ensure they are below MTOW.  To do this, the glider is weighed as described above at MTOW, and then tail dolly, wing dolly and tow bar are added and the glider is connected to the car and the main wheel weight is recorded.  As long as you are below this tow out weight each day, then theoretically, you are also below MTOW.

Back to the topic of the lousy sleep last night.  Our B&B is not air conditioned and yesterday was about 34 C and our room was HOT.  We opened the window, but for some reason they don't believe in screens in the window here in Europe, so then the mosquitoes started to join us around dusk.  We closed the window, but then it was hot again.  Finally, around 11 PM we could open the window and the mosquitoes were gone, but it was still hot and the road noise of cars and trucks and tractors and motorcycles and just about everything else just didn't quit until around 3 am and then started up again around 6 am.

Today, Jarek bought oscillating fans for everyone and we also added an insect repellent strip that will hopefully deter them from entering the room and we can have a good nights rest in advance of the first official training day tomorrow.