Pulpit New Years Eve

[XCanytime]

Went to the Pulpit early to meet up w/ Shawn Ray, Rich Bloomfield, and John Dullahan. Shawn moved to Colorado 6 1/2 years ago, and is visiting his mother in Chambersburg. Shawn brought along his stepfather Barry. Those two and Rich helped me take off around 9:45A into strong, moderately gusty conditions from the pad. Had a good launch in challenging conditions and elevatored right up. Flew around for a while under the overcast, getting to 600' over w/o even trying hard. After 15 minutes I saw a few virga showers to the WNW and WSW. Decided I wanted to be on the ground, since virga can produce gust fronts. Went out and had a nice landing on the golf course driving range. No sooner than Shawn, Barry, and Rich showed up we looked back up at the mountain and saw 2 pairs of 2 A-10 Warthogs smoking to the west over the ridge just south of launch. Damn glad I was on the ground. VR708 is a military training highway that runs around 280 degrees from NE of Waynesboro over the Blue Ridge to a dam west of Bedford, bisecting the Tuscarora Ridge around 1 mile south of launch. The Warthogs were most likely with the Maryland Air National Guard flying out of Martin State Airport outside of Baltimore. Packed up and ran into John at the launch. He bailed on the overcast mist and the strong, switchy conditions present. Made it to work with an hour to spare. Happy New Year . Bacil