Weekend Outlook

[XCanytime]

Weather Channel forecast has 40% chance of thunderstorms for Hagerstown today. Do you really want to gamble?

Bacil

[markc]

NWS is calling for "only" 20% . Yup, I'm going to give it a try, ETA
at 11:30 (carpooling with Janni).

MarkC

[XCanytime]

Looking good so far. Winds west at 12 MPH at Hagerstown at 11:25A. Bacil
]

[carweill]

Did anyone fly the Pulpit?

I was thinking of heading there but after 7 days of camping it took too long to get ready

Carlos

[Batman]

Yes, amaze us with feats of aviation bliss! Do tell, did Janni finally get to fly? I found myself floating in a large margarita for most of the afternoon ... actually most of the weekend. I might even need to step up to the podium and introduce myself ... Hi, my name is Chris ....

[mcelrah]

Warning: paragliding material ahead (but there is important regulatory info for anyone who flies in Shenandoah National Park).

Ellis, Josef and I carpooled to Dickie's LZ where we met Laszlo and Juanito, who had three tandem students and an assistant in tow. Arriving at the trailhead to launch, we were confronted by two park rangers, including head ranger Dixon Freeland, and were asked to produce our 2008 Shenandoah Park Hang-and Paragliding Permits. Ellis and I were so equipped (took us awhile to remember we had the wallet cards on us), but Juanito, Josef, and Laszlo didn't have them on their persons. (I make no representations about whether or not all three in fact have permits). Moreover, Ranger Freeland suspected that Juanito was conducting commercial activity (giving tandem rides for pay) in the park, which would require a different and even more complex permitting process. Juanito had identified me as CHGPA president and I remembered Dixon Freeman's name and was happy to actually meet him.

There was some confusion about:

(1) whether CHGPA ID is also required in addition to USHGA cards (Dixon accepted the USHPA credentials, but we need to confirm this - maybe send a current roster),
(2) whether we have to have a copy of the LZ landowner's permission on us (we believe the park permit application specifies "on file"; will confirm this also), and
(3) whether UNREMUNERATED tandem operations are implicitly permitted in the general permitting process (perhaps need to make explicit - but not sure it's such a red-hot site for tandem ops anyway).

The up shot was that Juanito and company were sent off with some ruffled feathers and decamped to Woodstock. Ellis, Laszlo, Josef and I proceeded to launch where Pete Shuman, Steve Kinsley, and Joe Schad were set up with hang-gliders. (They launched when we arrived and proceeded to get up about 1500 over.) My surmise is that the young female ranger who encountered the hangies at the trailhead was uncertain about the permitting and called her boss in to clarify things, whereupon the bagwingers arrived and reaped the benefit of all this attention from the authorities.

I went into damage control mode with Dixon Freeland; he seems favorably disposed to us - and paragliding in particular (fruits of Sparky's excellent diplomacy a couple years back), but we do NOT want to be seen to be violating the terms of the permit and especially not to be misrepresenting the nature of our activities. Park Rangers are no longer Smokey the Bear surrogates - they are law enforcement officers with badges, guns and bullet-proof vests in 90 degree heat - not to be messed with.

So let the word go out: be sure you have your permit and have it with you - the authorities can, and on occasion, do check.

I will follow up with Dixon Freeland this week. I broached the possibility of having CHGPA volunteers do some site maintenance according to whatever protocol the park may dictate and he seemed to be open to that discussion. Dixon is in effect our advocate with the Superintendent.

To return to flying reports: we judged the wind at 2 PM to be too strong and cross for safe PG launches at Dickie's and joined Juanito's crowd at Woodstock, where it was also cross and swirly in the slot, but there is a bit more margin for error there. I took the first flight and worked on the south finger for a bit, facing into a pronounced south cross. Juan did his first tandem without incident, having more success on the north finger. Laszlo suffered a number of aborted launches, as did Juan on his second tandem of the day. Josef got off on his second try, then Ellis had a clean launch and showed us that it was smoothing out a bit. Josef and Laszlo scurried back to launch and Laszlo chastised me for not having relaunched in the developing glassoff (I had thought we were going to the swimming hole back in the Fort Valley and maybe for trike rides at Front Royal). I offered to retrieve Ellis, who had landed thinking we were going on to the other activities, but she encouraged me to go ahead and join the others in the air. Juanito's last tandem launch was hairy (there's film): his heavier male passenger sat down in the harness a bit early and they proceeded to rock-skim down into the left corner of the slot (Juan got a big bump on the shin); Juan kept running and his passenger got back up; they finally got flying speed and pulled a huge climbing turn up out of the hole for a magnificent save - I had thought they were going in the trees for sure. After one abort, I too launched and proceeded to climb very slowly up the ridge to join Laszlo and Josef 200 feet over. After a few minutes, I followed Laszlo in a line of lift to 700 over, but noticed that I was making little forward progress. As the sun was approaching the horizon, used about 1/2 speed bar to get down and off the ridge. I'm logging an hour for the combined two flights. - Hugh

[RedBaron]

Went to the Pulpit with Mark. Cumies popping all over the place in fairly strong winds. Pete Lehman and us were the only pilots there, Pete left shortly after we arrived, however. He was tired from the ECC and didn’t think it was going to be all that good without wire-crew and stuff. It was blowing in pretty good and slightly cross, certainly too strong to self-launch from the slot. So we decided to check out the landing field situation. There was 5 feet tall grass in the upper primary, barley in the lower so we concluded that landing next to the grass in shorter barley was a good “emergency” option. We checked out two more fields, one is a long strip ways from the primary next to a house with short vegetation. I think we both would have landed there. Back to launch we set our gliders up and had to wait until 3 pm for the wind to back down some (it was doing 15-20 with gusts up to 25 for most of the time, but fairly straight in). Mark was kind enough to let me go first so he and a wuffo were pinning me down in the slot as I waited for a good 15 mph lull, LOL. It came, I launched and made 500 over in no time. Despite the noticeable cross the entire ridge was lifting and I was steadily climbing in extremely smooth air. Back at launch I noticed that the bowl was consistently producing thermals, so I headed there, placed my glider into the wind and was parked until my first ride came along. Took me to 2000 over. The next one took me to 3000’ and I drifted back with it for my first OTB Pulpit flight. I had the sky to myself, didn’t know where Mark was. Arrived at the knob-shaped mountain with 4000 over, cloud shadows downwind of me towards Chambersburg indicated the way I should have taken, but I decided to turn South and follow a cross-wind heading towards all those big fields I had familiarized myself with on my many drives to the Pulpit. I also didn’t know where Mark was, so avoiding retrieval complications as well as fences and power lines was a huge part of my thought process. I was also quite scared. This was my first flight on the Litespeed after my accident. I could not afford to screw up, so neither distance nor airtime were priorities. I headed down route 75 and was soon in sink, good time to pull in 2/3 VG and practice high speed glides I thought. I was zooming along 75 at 50 mph for 2 miles or so and did a pretty good job at keeping the glider on a straight heading. I was losing quickly also. Had a massive field picked when I blundered into a thermal at 1000 over. Took me to 2000’ and gave me another couple of miles now downwind. There was even a better field there, close to Williamson and route 995 as I learned later. There was small lift everywhere but I decided to stay committed to landing. It was doing a lot W on the ground, landed into 5-10 mph and flared way too aggressively for that type of wind. The keel of the glider hit the ground pretty hard. Breaking down in the heat was brutal, but a very nice man named Brian offered me a ride to his house for something to drink and then gave me a ride back to launch. I had by then learned that Mark had landed North of Chambersburg. I met him there for burger, beer and mountain-high mud pie at the Red Robin. What a day, I’m still grinning all over my face. I logged 10 miles and an hour (yeah, I know Matthew, not 30, I guess I was a little too excited when you called, LMAO). Had I had more confidence I’m sure I would have been able to fly much longer and further. Next time.
Ain’t no stopping the Red Baron.

[Spark]

expletives deleted.

I am concerned that you (and the larger community) could lose Dickey's if you don't take preventative action.

'nuf said.

[Matthew]

BIG CONGRATS JANNI!

Matthew

[XCanytime]

Great flight Janni! Bacil

[bigkreek]

Congrats Janni! Glad to hear that you flew the Litespeed and had a safe uneventful flight while being cautious and safe (kinda). I hope all your XC will go just as well, but longer and farther.

Fly very safe,
Rusty

[markc]

What a whirwind day and a half! Started out by heading to Highland, to catch up with friends at the after-ECC party on Saturday night, and to help celebrate the event with a few incendiaries. Initially looked like we might be washed out by a big t-storm, but lucky for us the brunt of it skirted by, and the party was able to continue outside after the screening of Jim's ECC video. After some setup, and with Carlos' help, we generated some post-tstorm lightning of our own. Hoping to share some of the video that Paul A. took, at some point.

From there it was many beers and lots of guitar jamming, with Bob B, the Gardinator, and myself taking turns. I kinda lost track of the time (not to mention the beers), finally crashing at 2AM. It was great to see Sheila, Bridget, & Charlotte, Lauren & Paul, and all the Highland guys & gals.

Back up by 6:45 on Sunday, bright & bleery. Decided to head to the Pulpit because I couldn't quite face a 96-degree day without some mountain-top cooling, and hit the road at 7:30. Linked up with Janni in Bethesda at 9:30, and we were off!

Winds when we arrived were 15-20 WSW with occasional W. Good direction and velocity for an attempt at the slot launch, but we first toured the LZs and then returned to set up. By the time we were ready, it was more like 20-25, with an occasional 30. Way too gusty to consider the slot, and the hang-waiting began. With more pilots present, I think that there would have been at least a handful of early launches, if not more.

(BTW, where was everybody??? It was NICE up in the mountains!!)

By around 3pm we noticed that conditions had mellowed a bit, with bonafide lulls of 15mph. Still gusting 20-25, but definitely good launchable cycles. So Janni gave it a try first with the help of one wuffo, and had a good launch. But there's not a lot of clearance, especially with the larger gliders... Although my U2 is way smaller, I decided to revert to the ramp, with two wuffos to help.

Yeah, wuffos. I know, not supposed to do it, not smart, it's an added risk. But they were capable guys, and I briefed them before both Janni's flight and mine. Sometimes you get a vibe about people, you know? They helped me up the ramp and over the hump, where conditions were totally doable, almost straight in. Phew!

(Would have backed off if I couldn't pick up and control the glider without their help.)

Once in the air, I briefly saw Janni working the bowl to the right of launch, at maybe 1500 over. Headed that way to find a thermal, and that was the last I saw of him. Found out later that he hit 4k over launch, but I wasn't finding anything like that. Eventually I headed back south, found a thermal that got me to 2k over launch, and drifted OTB with it in maybe 200 fpm up. Hit 2700 over on the backside of the ridge, and then followed a line of blue-lift that was tracking more-or-less along Route 30.

What a fun flight!!!! It was totally brain-dead soarable, just poking along in zero sink, throwing in a turn or two to regain a few feet every once and a while, and quite literally sight-seeing the entire time. Climbed once to 3200 over, not that I really needed it. Flew over Parnell Knob for kicks. Flew over Chambersburg, checking out the schools, churches, and ball fields. Watched the trucks on I-81 cruising along. A real pleasure.

But I did have a few concerns: a) no other pilots out there with us; b) Janni presumably also somewhere OTB; c) hot as hell on the ground; d) getting late. So I decided that it would make the most sense to land near civilization, where there'd be a better chance of hitch-hiking, or even calling a cab, to get back to the truck.

So I blew off 2500 feet on the north-east edge of C-burg and just shy of I-81, landing in a farmer's field behind a new shopping strip. Had two flags to help with wind direction, and saw that it was blowing pretty hard on the ground, about 15, which made the landing easy. Kind of regretted cutting the flight short, but it was probably the thing to do given the circumstances.

Walked the glider off the field into the shade of a building in an office park, with a plush green lawn in front. Made an initial call to Janni, then headed over to Sheetz for a pre-breakdown vanilla milkshake. Then over to Red Robin, for a post-breakdown beer while waiting for Janni. We had dinner there (my treat, thanks for the pick-up Janni!!) and then we headed for home.

I couldn't quite match Janni's grin, but I came close. This was my first & only XC opportunity of the year thus far.

MarkC

[mcelrah]

Congratulations to both of you! Interesting how much lighter it was further south - duh. - Hugh

[carweill]

Nice flying Janni and Mark.
In one day you did what I didn't in seven days.

Carlos