10th Annual Highland Aerosports Fly-In

[aerosports]

Greetings,
Highland will be celebrating our 10th anniversary on June 27 and 28 with our annual Flatland Fly-in. We'll have some fun flying, demos, friendly competition, and of course some festivities Saturday evening. This will be our last June fly-in. Next year and on it will be moved to the fall. If you are planning on attending, please shoot us an email to hanglide@aerosports.net and be sure to include your shirt size. Hope to see you out here!

Blue Skies,
The Highland Crew

[Dan T]

I am tentatively planning on attending the fly in on Saturday. My plans went from firm to tentative when I broke my hand yesterday. Playing softball no less! A year in Iraq, a few weeks flying a paraglider in thermic conditions, a first flight on a hang glider in a year, and I break my hand playing softball.

Anyway if I go, and I am not sure I will, I'll drive for the price of a dinner and a couple of beers, or maybe 3 or so.

Dan T

[mcelrah]

Dan,

That's terrible! When I was on active duty, I always considered softball a form of malingering. And ya oughta wear a helmet. Joking - I really am sorry this happened.

- Hugh

[RedBaron]

Oh NOOOOooooo!

What a bummer. Sorry to hear Dan.

I played baseball (pitching) competitively for almost 10 years and got hit by line drive shots several times. I had guys slide into me with razor-sharp cleats at the plate.

I crashed into a tree and fell to the ground. I blew my launch at WS and crashed into the rocks. I dove straight into the ground in the WS primary and took my entire bottom rigging out.

The one and only time I broke a bone was at a beach in South Spain when I kicked a pebble that turned out to be a half ton boulder buried in the sand.

Life sometimes just doesn't make any sense.

Take it easy Dan. Sh*t happens!

[Lauren Tjaden]

ohh, so sorry Dan. Better plan on four beers, not three...
Lauren

[KirkLewis]

Sorry to hear about your hand

Dr. Jacks is saying Saturday is going to be AWESOMEEEEEEE. So I'm happy with Dr. Jacks again.

[KirkLewis]

Great. Now look what it says



OK not really but it does say the shear is going to be bad now lol :/

[KirkLewis]

Alsow Weather Underground is saying that it is going to be partly cloudy on Sunday, with chances of thunderstorms, with 0% cloud cover. Great site Janni

[KirkLewis]

OK now Dr. Jacks says it's going to be awesome again! I take back everything I ever said about Dr. Jacks.

[mcgowantk]

I had a good laugh at the Dr Jacks map.

The changing soar cast reminds me of an early fly-in on the Eastern Shore. After having a great Saturday, most everyone stayed over to fly Sunday. But waking up, the FAA soar cast said "Negative thermal height" that "Eliminated any chance of thermal soaring." We all had a good laugh after flying at 5k plus cloud base for hours later that day.

Sorry to miss this fly-in. Have fun and good luck.

Tom McGowan

[mcelrah]

I could only be there Saturday, but had a blast. Brought my work colleague Fabienne out for a tandem, which she thoroughly enjoyed. I think we have a new recruit! Then Janni, Danny, Carlos, Charlie from NY and I pressed her into service as a retrieve driver. I was flying Ellis' (previously Kinsley's and Janni"s) 155 Sport 2, which Matthew and I had both test-flown awhile ago and pronounced to be heavy in roll. The first time I went to the line, discovered a grossly too long hang loop (Sunny said there was no way I could have flown that loop at Daniel's - would have been below the bar). Danny came up with a shorter one which was usable with Sunny's special double twist. The Sport 2 towed like on rails and thermalled automatically. After futzing around with a tangled zipper line, I was down to 1850, but easily reacquired the thermal Zack had dropped me in and climbed 2500 feet in it as I drifted over Ridgely and toward Denton. Other thermals I found were mostly zero-sink or hard to hold on to, but the wind was pretty strong, so I made it 15 miles to between Denton and Bridgeville. My GPS died halfway, so I followed strict IFR rules ("I follow roads"). Landed in a big newly harvested field and carried off into the shade of a big tree in someone's backyard to break down. Turns out the lady's neighbor called to tell her some guy with a kite was in her back yard. She thought this was really weird when she came out - like I had come from Mars - but she and the neighbor warmed up after awhile and took pictures. It took Fabienne a gratifyingly long time to find me - she had never been across the Bay Bridge before. After she collected me in Carlos' nice truck, we followed zig-zag Nuvi GPS instructions on a bunch of back roads to find Charlie, who had made 35 miles on his way to the declared goal of Salisbury ("SALI1" in the ECC waypoint list - 41 miles from Ridgely). Not wanting to land in the 2-foot high corn, he had landed on the grass margin of a tertiary paved road right across the street from power lines - hell of a landing! Matthew and Karen showed up late - Janni and I man-towed Matthew in his paraglider in the breeze. Then Karen took a late day mile high tow, followed by Christie. (It was good for Fabienne to meet Karen, Judy, and Christie - who wowed her with her fluent French.) The dinner was great and the fireworks even better. Enjoyed playing frisbee in the dark with Mark Cavanaugh's lighted disc. All hail to Highland Aerosports on their 10th anniversary! - Hugh

[CraginS]

Regrettably, I missed the party day on Saturday,sinceI was home fighting a broken computer all day. However, I agreed with Kay that i REALLY needed to fly.I had the truck ready to go Saturday night, and was on the road a few minutes after 7 on Sunday. Arrived at Highland about 8:30, to see plenty of gliders setup, but no flying happening. Fairly windy, so I was not surprised.
Started setting up, and was ready by 9:30. Still no tug or anxious pilots pushing in line. Finally, the first launches began about noon. I watched a few, then joined the line. My turn behind the tug was at 12:55. Rowdiest tow I had ever had. Not scary, but darn busy. Once off tow, I looked around,and finally found a thermal at about 1700'. Rode that one to 3100', then only able to play around at 2500 or so. Never did get another solid one.
Eventually landed with 34 minutes flight time, max alt of3100 AGL, and a very sweet no-stepper just off from the windsock.

Much longer tale, along with a 2 minute video from my flight, is at my blog.

Happy 10th, Highland!

[RedBaron]

They put on a good show. I had fun and a couple good flights. Particularly pleased that I came in second in the spot landing contest. Simon beat me to the first place by 4 feet or so pulling off a radical stall maneuver
I also flew the new U2, the Malibu and Bob's Exxtacy.
The new U2 seems a lot meaner than Hugh's older model U2. I noticed adverse yaw and it was wing-walking a lot on me on tow in, admittedly, demanding conditions. Still, I felt that it was a handfull, not easier to tow than my Litespeed and in that respect closer to a H4 than a H3 glider. Glide and climb seemed to be very good, though.
The new SS Malibu, and I'm a huge Moyes fan, was a disappointment. It felt big (188 squares), it kept sticking a wing and I had terrible landings on it. No Falcon 3 for sure.
Flying Bob's rigid was exciting and I was very nervous before launch since I've never flown a rigid before. It was weird. Zero roll pressure, very pitch sensitive and with flaps engaged it assumed the flight characteristics of a parachute. I was perhaps at 1500' over and a 1/4 mile away from my landing spot in a moderate head wind. Had to release the flaps again to make it. Amazing. Not my cup of tea, especially on the ground, but I certainly see the appeal of a package that offers great performance in a hang glider that is as easy to fly as a single surface glider (if not easier).
I had fun. Happy 10th Highland, you guys have done a tremendous job.

[kcarra]

Just wanted to report that I got my vario back. Thanks to everyone who helped look for it. Also thanks to Bob for taking it to Hyner for me and special thanks to Danny for lending me one before we knew that mine had been found. Danny, I can either mail it to you wait until we're at the same flying site again - let me know.

Karen

[Danny Brotto]

Karen

Glad that your vario showed up. Just hold on to mine and I'll get it from you at some future time; no worries.

Please let us all know how Hyner turned out.

Danny Brotto