Big Blow Yesterday

[lbunner]

After the front blew through SE PA yesterday, I couldn't help but notice the well defined cumuli that dotted the sky. It was interesting watching the flat bottomed clouds forming in spite of 50 mph winds. The B/S ratio must have been pretty high to allow the clouds to form without getting ripped apart.

[RichH]

Larry I noticed the same thing yesterday and sent a message to another pilot friend of mine ...the sky here was very well developed for a high wind day in Feb..I was able to watch a hawk climbing fairly quickly up to a 1000 ft or so before he split quickly down wind..Hope that speaks well for the upcoming season

[Danny Brotto]

Don't know Rich... regardless of the clouds, siding blew off my house yesterday! Think that's a sure sign not to be flying!

Danny Brotto

[lbunner]

How high did your siding get?

[Danny Brotto]

So I did a quick, rough calculation. The siding must have cleared an about 60 ft roofline. It ended up about 250 ft away. Assuming a glide ratio of siding to be 1:1, I calculate the wind to have been ~60 mph. That seems about right.

So if you had launched from one of our mountain sites and immediately turned downwind on a straight glide, you would have gone over 10 miles and logged 6 minutes.

Now if you could have climbed at 1,000 ft/minute to 5K MSl and gone on straight glide from there, you would have gone about 60 miles in about 37 minutes! a 500 ft/minute climb would have resulted in an almost 70 mile flight!

Guess we should have rigged

Danny Brotto

[RichH]

No one was suggesting that it was flyable only that the cloud conditions for this time in the year and with the high wind conditions was unusual but I did appreciate the siding anaylsis..Rich

[Danny Brotto]

Heigel

Read as "twisted evil"...

You not getting the emoticons?

d.

[RichH]

Of course I do