Saturday’s Sailplane Adventures in Wave Land…

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Danny Brotto
Posts: 709
Joined: Mon Feb 14, 2005 9:29 pm

Saturday’s Sailplane Adventures in Wave Land…

Post by Danny Brotto »

A few Fairfield diehards rigged in the early morning on Saturday under an overcast sky with plenty of snow flurries around. With a few wave windows opening through the overcast, we commenced towing just after 9:00 am. I was the second off taking a tow to 4000 ft AGL. I doodled around at cloud base a bit looking for a hole to climb through. Found one as the sky opened up a bit. Eventually we got to a little 8000 ft MSL. WM flew to the Lewistown ridge hopping from wave bar to wave bar. LBL flew to the McConnelsburg ridge dropping down to see if the ridge was working; it wasn’t. The thermals kept him aloft and eventually he made it back into the wave. The wave eventually dissipated after about 1:30 pm and we flew weak but plentiful thermals. It was cold at altitude (-10C) and it never got above freezing on the ground. They were making snow at Liberty all day.

As the day went on it became clearer until after 2:00 or so, it was cloudless. You could see the drier air progressivly moving in from the west.

Pix courtesy of Baude Litt… hope you enjoy.

Danny Brotto

Me (P6) and Mike Higgens (WM)

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Baude reported that ice covered the trees on the south side of the Pulpit ridge while the north side remained rather clear; that’s rather unusual.

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mcelrah
Posts: 2323
Joined: Thu Jan 06, 2005 11:30 pm

Re: Saturday’s Sailplane Adventures in Wave Land…

Post by mcelrah »

Thanks, Danny. We saw some weak wave at Front Royal on Sunday. Dunno about Saturday. - Hugh
P.S. Does M-ASA need tow pilots? Got an ATP who might be a candidate...
XCanytime
Posts: 2630
Joined: Thu Jan 06, 2005 11:45 pm

Re: Saturday’s Sailplane Adventures in Wave Land…

Post by XCanytime »

Danny,
Thanks for the pics. I noticed all the wave action on the early drive out to Smithsburg Saturday morning, wondering if there were any early bird sailplane pilots exploiting the waves.

Bacil
mikel
Posts: 258
Joined: Mon Nov 14, 2005 10:30 am
Location: Leesburg, VA

Re: Saturday’s Sailplane Adventures in Wave Land…

Post by mikel »

Danny,

The photos are awesome ! keep them coming

Thank you,

Mike
Mike Lee

How 'Bout That
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