Chairman’s Contribution *

New Airfield Control Frequency *

Radio *

CFI’s Bits *

Rockpolishers 2000 *

Crewing for 493, Northerns 1999 *

From the Flying Field *

Northern Notes *

Plan B, What Plan B? *

Oxygen - or Lack Thereof *

"Ladies And Gentlemen, For My Next Trick I Will Set Myself On Fire"* *

Episode One *

The Mynd Online *

Task Week 21^st-30^th August 1999 *

The weather has been a bit of a disaster this summer. According to BBC News this was the wettest August in the Birmingham area since records began. However task week managed to get in six worthwhile tasks out of a possible maximum of ten, and a good proportion of pilots finished tasks on most days. In spite of the weather this was a worthy follow up to the excellent task week last year.

The Long Mynd seems to be producing quite a crop of competition minded pilots, and this year we sent a large team of six pilots to Sutton Bank for the Northern Regionals in early August. Rose Johnson won the ‘working class’, as they insisted on calling it, perhaps marginally better than the ‘stubbies’ which is how they had referred to gliders with a handicap of less than 106 in previous years. She not only won, but she did so by scoring an incredible 97% of the possible maximum points. Iain Evans came third in the open class so the club was able to hold its head high. Liz Sparrow (previously Liz Bertoya) joined us as an unofficial Mynd competitor, and a good time was had by all. Seven pilots plus crew makes for quite a large party.

Last time I mentioned the imminent arrival of the motorglider, it was delayed endlessly by red tape, but it finally arrived on site in the middle of August. It is a fine machine, in very good condition, and will probably serve the syndicate (one member being the club itself) well. I am delighted it takes marginally less hangar space than a K23, and plans are well advanced to hang the second K23 from the roof. The cost of that operation will be covered by the syndicate. I am pleased to note that the motorglider has a very subdued noise footprint, so with careful operation it should not cause any extra annoyance to our neighbours.

Sadly, I feel sure that the time has come to part with an old friend. When I started gliding at the Mynd, we had 585 and 797 as our two K21s. 585 went to a private syndicate at Aston Down several years ago, leaving its comp number free for Ken and Clive’s LS4B, and 797 has continued to clock up the hours at a huge rate. Unfortunately there was a 12,000 hour limit on K21s, and 797 is only some 1200 hours from it. The BGA have sanctioned a 1000 hour extension recently, and they, with the German authorities, are certain to increase it still further in future. Unfortunately time is not on our side, since our K21s can clock up 750 hours in a year. I believe that a glider with 2200 hours left to the existing limit, with more to come, will still be attractive to either a private syndicate, or to a weekend club, neither of whom would be troubled by the limit in the forseeable future. Therefore I think we should sell it now before we erode that margin any further. The committee agree that we should advertise it now, and start looking for another K21 through the winter.

I imagine that we could swap it for an aircraft like JGJ, which had some 6000 hours when we bought it, but was old and in need of some TLC, for a difference of just a few thousand pounds. I have already asked two brokers who scour the continent for used gliders to see what they can find.

The CFI has done a lot of work on presenting the flying statistics to the committee, and they clearly show that, whilst our ‘public’ flying, like courses and trial lessons, is well supported, our members’ private glider launches, and to a lesser extent hours, are well down and, worse still, are showing a continuing downward trend. This is a very worrying trend, since we are a members club, yet those members are becoming less interested in flying.

I believe we all need to participate in an ongoing debate on the future shape of the club, since we may be at something of a crossroads. I suspect that we will have to move forward in one of two possible directions. We could go on improving the fleet, and our facilities generally, and keep moving towards becoming more of a commercial enterprise, financed by offering the public trial lessons and courses as well as corporate entertainment. Alternatively we could reduce costs and shrink to a fleet and an infrastructure suitable for the needs of our members alone. At the extreme, the latter course could result in the Mynd becoming a soaring group along the lines of Sleap, where training is reduced to the basic minimum required to keep existing members current, plus a very small amount of new member recruitment.

If you think the above suggestions are a bit extreme, just ask yourself what a typical weekend’s flying would look like without any trial lessons, and what sort of courses could we run if they were restricted to our members alone. Our present fleet and our costs would be totally excessive for the demand.

The detailed analysis of the problems will not be possible until we have a better database of our flying records, a project which James Moore is looking into. When we have that capability I will be asking questions like "How much flying do our members do in club aircraft, split into weekdays and weekends?" and "How much of members’ weekday flying is done on courses?"

The reason why the questions need asking at all is because the treasurer reports that we will make a loss this year, in spite of the influx of new members following our successful membership weekend in May. I was worried at the time that the large number of new members might swamp our training capacity, but in fact they have been coped with without problem, having merely filled in the gap created by reduced amounts of flying from the rest of the membership.

To sum up, over the next few years we must either increase income or reduce costs or both, at a time when income from members is falling. Some of the possible options are to concentrate on ‘public’ flying, or increase fees to members, or cut back on our fleet and other costs.

Please think about the future and discuss it with your fellow members whenever you can. The MGC is your club, and the committee’s job to manage it in the way that you want, so do not be shy, speak up and let them have your thoughts. As ever you can leave me a message at any time on 01426 954208 or Email me at jfack@mcmail.com.

Within a height of 3000 feet and a radius of 10 nautical miles keep a listening watch on this frequency and use it for circuit joining.

When leaving to go cross country announce your intention to do so, and the frequency you will be changing to.

Don’t forget to change back on your return.

While on the subject of RT, a number of people seem not to know or have forgotten that the order of callsigns is

• Who you are calling
• Who you are

If you start with your own callsign, most people won’t know that you want to attract their attention, so when you use their callsign they have forgotten who you are. So if I am in the Pegasus and want to call Nick in the Ventus, I would call "154, Foxtrot Victor Papa". As soon as he hears "154" he will concentrate on the rest of the message rather than filtering it out. It gets especially confusing if someone calls something like (Mynd launch, Mynd Clubhouse" (which you should never hear on airband anyway).

Also the word "over" is not now used, it should be clear when you have finished speaking and expect a reply. The other day I heard someone call "Long Mynd, XXX downwind, over." I wonder who he expected to reply?

Within the club there is a vast range of flying experience, from the pre-solo pilot (abinitio), to the seasoned expert (pundit). The abinitios have it all ahead of them yet to be discovered, while the pundits do their own thing and wow us all with their stories!

You sit somewhere between the two, and in order to progress, both you and our instructors need to know where. This is why we have our stage system. The system consists of five colour coded progress stages:

White: This is the pre-solo card, and lists the exercises and skills you must acquire to go solo.

Orange: The early soaring card, where you learn to thermal, read the sky and soar with other gliders.

Red: The busiest card of all! It progresses you through the Bronze Badge and the Cross Country Endorsement.

Yellow: The card for pilots cleared to fly cross country following an instructor’s briefing.

Blue: When you have completed your Silver and both parts of the Cross Country Diploma, and have become a seasoned cross country pilot, perhaps being considered as an instructor, then maybe blue’s for you!

If you haven’t already got them ask the office for a pack of all the cards. They clearly show the progression from one to another and each card shows its limitations, currency requirements and annual renewal status.

The White, Orange and Red cards all have exercises and briefings that require completion, so you must have your card with you at the launch point. Show the card and your log book to the instructor before you fly and mention then any specific things you would like to do, so that the flight can be designed around your requirements. For instance, if your Red card has almost every thing signed off, say that you would like to progress to Yellow. It is no good asking the instructor afterwards to sign off things that you think you might have done.

Just try to imagine us not having a discipline of flying a circuit prior to landing. Gliders coming in from all directions, not checking for wind, last minute low turns, long approaches out of the sun . . . !!

Flying a circuit before the approach and landing is a statement of intent.

It clears your mind to cope with the change of task, from soaring to landing, and it lets others know what you are about to do.

Every flight you take should have built into it the intention of starting a circuit at a safe height in the right place and of flying the circuit in a predictable manner. There are no exceptions. On a cross-country flight you intend to get back or reach a goal, but you leave knowing that you might land out. If this is the case then the circuit you fly into your chosen field should be as good as the one you intended to fly on your return. If you are flying a trial lesson your flight must be designed to get you back to the airfield using a conventional circuit, so you do your exercises upwind and you do not get low.

The other aspect of this is that while soaring at an airfield we keep clear of the circuit. By all means on a weak westerly day, thermal away from the ridge if you are climbing, but do not try to scratch away if your position conflicts with the day’s circuit pattern.

Our collision a few months ago and Camphill’s tragedy both happened in the circuit. At the recent instructors meeting it was clearly spelt out that any future abuse of the circuit would result in down staging, or suspension for instructors.

Following Rose Johnson’s success in getting the Mynd team to within a wingspan of winning Rockpolishers two years running I have the unenviable task of taking over from her as team captain for next year. Rose did a great job organising everyone, giving advice when requested, sometimes when not, and was an inspirational leader doing so well in her own personal competition endeavours. I would like to take this opportunity to say thanks to Rose on behalf of all who took part as pilots or crew over the last few years and congratulations on winning the sport class in the Northern Regionals at Sutton Bank this year.

As we enter the next thousand years of Rockpolishing it may be a good time for our newer members to be introduced to the concept. Rockpolishers is one of a number of inter-club leagues that take place across the country. Our league is made up of Aston Down, Nympsfield, Talgarth, Usk, Shobden and the Long Mynd, all ridge sites, hence the rock polishing aphorism. There are three classes:

• Novice for anyone who has not competed in a Regional competition or claimed a Gold distance.
• Intermediate for anyone not having competed in a Nationals competition.
• Pundit open to anyone.

There are four events each year held over weekends roughly a month apart during the soaring season. These events take place at the club sites on a rotational basis so that each year two of the clubs do not compete at home.

At each event the home team provides a competition director, task setter and met person and we all pray for good soaring conditions. Points are awarded for positions in each class over the two days and aggregated for the whole event, giving weekend scores for each team. Winners get 6, second 5 and so on. Day winner prizes are usually awarded in each class. The overall winner at the end of the four events goes forward to the National Finals to meet the winners of all the other leagues.

Although it is a competition the idea of the event has always been to introduce novices to cross country flying, provide opportunities to fly at other sites, learn some of the more arcane side of competition rules and to meet and mix with more experienced pilots with a view to learning from them. It is not unusual for instance to find oneself on the grid with a former World Champion! It is good humoured, good experience and above all good fun.

My primary objectives next year will be to get as many people to fly as possible. The rules say that any one person can fly up to four days during the whole competition. Clearly it makes sense for days to be at the same event where possible. However this year we had more pilots than available competition days and I hope that this will remain true next year.

My secondary objective will be to win so if there is competition amongst ourselves for places preference may be given to those who have already completed some cross country flights early in the year, however small. There is nothing better than currency.

Pilots can fly their own gliders or, with the CFI’s permission, hire a club K23 for the weekend. Flying in inter-league competitions is usually covered by standard glider insurance. Pilots need to be able to arrange a crew to support them.

Not all the other club sites have accommodation at the airfield so sometimes other arrangements need to be made. People have taken tents or caravans in the past, booked into local B&Bs or even slept in the trailers!

To follow recent tradition I have asked Dominic Haughton to act as deputy. He will stand in for me if necessary and help with the organisation. You can contact either of us if you need information.

As soon as the venues and dates are confirmed next year, probably around March, a notice will be posted on the club notice board and on the web site (www.longmynd.com) . Anyone wishing to fly or crew should put their names on the notice and the weekends that they are available or send me an email. I will then post the team list and venues as soon as possible after. This is a great opportunity to improve your flying while having even more fun (the Saturday night barbecue is worth the trip on its own) so I hope to have a long list of potential Rockpolishers to choose from. Next year we will be short of Novices as several of our stalwarts have recently become Intermediates so I want to hear from all you aspiring Pundits.

If anyone wants more information or would like to get their name on the list early (preference will be given to those who register early) please speak to me at the club, call me on 01244 332766, fax me on 01244 332767 or send an email to rockpolishers@webz.co.uk

Being that this years Northerns was my first time attending a competition in gliding I was given the wink and asked if I would like to share my experience with the Mynd newsletter. Here goes.

I suppose I failed in my first and slightly important task as crew member for Discus 493, by allowing Dominic Haughton, pilot (important word that one), sole responsibility for getting the aircraft to Sutton Bank GC. You see I live near Preston and it seemed much better sense to travel over Saturday morning and take up my duties then, foregoing all the rigours of trailer towing, checking in, registration etc. All by accident.

When I arrived as expected the field and club were swarming with caravans, tents, gliders, cars and people. I quickly found pilot and RIGGED glider, things seemed well in hand, all that was left to do was attend the task briefing, win the day, de-rig, food and beer. This crewing business was looking all right!

After the pilot briefing I thought I should seek out a ‘crew’ briefing as it was my first time at a competition. It was also Dominic’s first competition so I thought I would go further afield and tackled Nick Heriz-Smith and the Parrys, seasoned veterans(!). John immediately launched into the finer points of crewing, to be rebuked with a "Oh shut up John" from Nick. Humm, … and this was a team, there was obviously something of an art to crewing after all, only I think it was something I was going to have to experience and not be told.

Anyway the basic points are these; get your glider rigged, DI’d, washed, polished, whatever and ready for flight, next find out its correct grid position ready for the day’s task and GRID the glider. Next fill with water if required. Launch your glider, with pilot on board, and finally be on hand for re-lights (that’s other launches available after the whole grid has been launched) and retrieving of pilot/glider if need be. Simple.

Returning to 493 all I had to do now was get the glider to the correct grid position, man-handle what probably would be a gibbering pilot in to it and strap him in, so he can’t escape. But how do I get through/round the 40 gliders parked up between us and the grid! Aaarr! Having just been told my duties it was clear I was going to fail in the crew’s prime objective of getting the glider to its correct grid position. Patience was going to be needed. Later I vowed not to be in this position again! All very frustrating.

Finally the two classes, Open and Sport, get launched and I hear Dominic announce that 493 has started on task. Now it was free time and the sky was still mildly active although showing signs of bluing up due to the coming sea breeze. Why not take a two seater, have a check flight and do some local soaring I thought? This had been touched on earlier in the day and I was advised it was not a good idea, as I was new to crewing and Dom new to competition flying! Although I had faith in my pilot I heeded the warnings and elected to erect camp instead. (Although there is a rather funny story to be told here I’m sure you will hear it elsewhere and therefore will pass). An hour or so later the radio was alive with the words "xxx good finish" and so I return to watch and play the torturous wait for my glider to return. Patience takes on a new meaning at this point in time as you witness some gliders successfully finish and others ‘not,’ having miscalculated their final glide or the sink that can be associated with hill sites. Then those most welcome words come over the 130.1Mhz air band, "Sutton, 493 five minutes." "Yeahar, come on Dom" you shout to your insides and secretly do a celebratory dance, as your pilot nears goal. After a successful finish it was time to spring into action again and retrieve glider and pilot, who by this time is aimlessly wandering around in a haze of bewilderment, congratulations and the accounts of what happened which could now start. De-rig of 493 is always quick, well it’s a Discus! Next, consultation on which pub and when and the day is almost over. Only… not this day! You see there is still a K21, Ventus and Hornet in fields out there somewhere. Again another story! One I alluded to earlier, suffice to say a crew’s work is never done!!

Day 2 saw 493 collapse on its belly while 10 minutes away from launch! Inadvertently my pilot somehow caught the undercarriage lever while organising his cockpit. Fortunately the glider was level, and with the undercarriage doors splayed wider than normal, I assume due to an MGC mod, little to no damage could be detected on inspection by the surrounding experts. All this duly rattled Dominic some and so when I heard him announce his start some 30 minutes after the main bunch of Sports class, I thought he’d blown it. But again halfway through the finishers I heard "Sutton, 493 five minutes." YES come on Dom! Along with 493 were a string of other calls and I was able to witness a truly special sight as 6 gliders all came screaming in for a finish within the space of 30 seconds, lead of course by 493. It felt like Formula 1 and Dominic was provisionally posted joint pole with our Julian Fack in Discus 173. Later when the official results were pinned up, 493 had dropped down to 11^th place. Something had finally gone wrong!

On investigating the next morning and managing to avoid an embarrassing tannoy call to see the ‘Headmaster’ Dominic learnt of a start infringement and I heard the following;

Comp director (explaining judging the start line to Dom): "No you shouldn’t look out the cockpit you should ...

Club CFI: "Err-hum" … (said rather loudly)

at which point there is much laughter by all, and Comp director quickly rearranges his sentence.

All in all a very enjoyable first competition, with barbecues, beer, parties, more beer, oh and some tough competing in between. As well as making friends I also met some members from my local gliding club at Chipping competing with their Open Cirrus, and Bob Fox, who I had spoken to on the phone (re Standard Cirrus’s etc.) but not met, and Derek Piggott was also there. Why weren’t you?!

Welcome to new members David Brammer, Sarah Clevely and Anthony Finbow.

Congratulations to Jose Alcaraz, Peter Greaves-Tunnell, Rob Kronenberg, Mark Latham and Tim Marris on going solo, and Colin Calderhead, Richard Langford, Tim Mason and David Rance on Silver distances, which completes Silver for Richard. Congratulations also to Rose Johnson on winning the Sports Class at the Northern Regionals held at Sutton Bank. Six Mynd pilots with crews went to the Northerns, including Dominic Haughton and Jon Hall for their first regionals. Dominic gained his Gold distance while there. Meanwhile Len Dent and Roland Bailey have been experiencing exciting flying in America, Paul Stanley took 494 to the Lasham Regionals and Chris Alldis won a day in the Club Class Nationals.

A successful and enjoyable Task Week was held with six competition days, Iain Evans being the overall winner. Nick’s aim as task setter on the last day was to get all gliders back. The result was one glider back (494 with Paul Stanley and Richard Hinley) and a mixture of landouts near Abergavenny, aerotow retrieves from Shobdon and aborted tasks. It was good to see so many people back for the presentation in the evening.

And how was it that on the first Saturday of the Northerns eight of the twelve Mynd members were to be found in a field derigging a glider that was not in the competition? Clue: Paul Shuttleworth was crewing for Jon Hall. Jon was one of the few not in the field. Another crew member, Richard Langford, was in the field, but did not arrive by car. Well, you’ve probably heard some version of the story already, and yes, the answer is it was a Yorkshire GC K21, and Paul had taken Richard for a local flight while the competition was on task. Richard had his pilot’s (Iain Evans) car keys with him.

The first puzzle for John and me was why was Iain forlornly by his glider in the middle of the airfield after finishing? Where was his crew? John went to fetch Iain while I rounded up Julian (hooray, my pilot back!). I managed to catch up with John just as he was leaving to retrieve Nick, who, strangely, was not among the finishers. Another puzzle for us was why was it Paul waiting by the road to show us where the field was? Last we’d seen him he was going off to fly saying something about mustn’t land out. Despite having earlier wondered if the Northerns operated like the Archers we didn’t understand until reaching the field. Which contained as well as 154 and two other competition gliders, the K21 and a pink-faced Richard.

When the teasing died down we derigged 154, despatched a Discus and then waited for the K21 trailer to arrive, which it did with Julian and Iain. Meanwhile Rose, who had also got back, second finisher and winning the day, was out fetching Jon Hall, thus making it three competition pilots who finished out to fetch one who didn’t and two crew members who didn’t either. After the next phase of stories, teasing Richard and taking photographs, there was a derig by committee into an unknown trailer set up for two different gliders. John towed the K21 back with the Discovery and Julian asked for the two lightest people to go with him towing 154 to give him a good chance at the Bank. This is the steep road up Sutton Bank which is prohibited for caravans, though that doesn’t stop people trying, ask Iain.

We wondered why Nick didn’t get back, when Dominic, Julian, Iain, Rose and Liz (honorary Mynd member, Liz Sparrow previously Bertoya, veteran of our task weeks and on her first regionals) all did. It turned out he had flown a different task from the others, going to Doncaster rather than Doncaster NW. He was controlled alright for the correct TP, but in flying further ran out of day for getting back. Despite a lengthy discussion with Iain about their flying that day Nick didn’t realise this until the call to control the next day. It was the first time John hadn’t double checked the turning points, so he didn’t notice Nick had selected the wrong one.

On Sunday a small task was set due to the thundery start to the day. The whole team got back, with Julian the first finisher, 25 minutes before our estimate. Well, we crew need to have some idea of how long we have for sunbathing, not fetching fuel for nearly empty retrieve vehicles and generally lazing about. The provisional results showed Julian and Dominic equal third. This was the day while grid squatting there was a strange noise and I looked round from polishing 173 to see 493 settled lower on the ground, Dominic having managed to knock the undercarriage lever. Luckily there was no damage. The next day it was Dominic’s turn to be called to control, he blew his position by having failed to make a good start. However as he had been in the zone 30 minutes earlier he did have a start that counted. This, and some other pilot’s penalty, put Julian second for the day.

On Monday the Open Class (in which Nick and Iain flew) grid was moved to launch into the freshening SE wind, and the baby class (Sport Class, the rest of the Mynd team) prepared to follow, ending up in a long line of gliders and cars rather than a grid. It was still gloriously warm and sunny. There was much reluctance by the baby class to fly in the conditions. Some Open Class gliders were relighting. Then there was an indecipherable tannoy announcement, but judging by the cheers from the end of the line it sounded like a scrub for Sport Class. I thought they were here because they wanted to fly? This precipitated a race back to the trailers, nearly won by Julian, and another derig of all gliders due to the forecast thunderstorms. This was the day one of the sniffer gliders didn’t make it back on the hill, landing in a field of crop at the bottom, apparently from having been on circuit. Eight got back that day, including Nick and Iain. They said the day was only possible for big wings, and had both taken climbs in a huge storm, water pouring into the gliders. Rose by now had established her lead in the Sport Class after two competition days.

After a scrubbed day both classes were on task on Wednesday. Nick lost some more points by having missed his start on Monday, both his loggers showed the same story of turning too soon. Dominic’s crew of David D’Arcy had changed to Richard Hinley, who had been off partying on Tuesday evening with Richard Langford among others. This meant I helped Dominic rig on Wednesday. By now the Mynd team was well practised at rigging, getting out of the way of others without getting boxed in, gridding, moving the grid, and then reversing the process as we kept on putting returned gliders away because of forecast storms which failed to materialise. On Wednesday we were up and rigged long before most others. The day turned into the mass land-out day, only one of the two ASH-25s got back and 37 gliders landed out. This prompted a lot of confusion at control, as many gliders were in the same fields, all around the last turning point, Wetherby. As one pilot said, what can you expect of a TP called WET? I waited for 20 minutes at control after being called before I got Julian’s details. He was in a select field containing only Derek Piggott, who landed immediately after Julian.

This day left Iain second overall in the Open Class and Rose still in the lead in the Sport Class having come third on the day. It was Jon’s turn to mess up on TPs and starts, he didn’t make the first TP so was only scored for 50 km or so. The only finisher of the day went from top to bottom of his class because he didn’t make the start properly (100 point penalty) and all the other pilots were within 100 points of him.

Thursday was scrubbed after the expected clearance failed to appear. Barbecue and cocktail happy hour in the evening, which I came back to after we’d eaten out (the real reason for the Northern expeditions), to find Dominic and Jon perched side by side drinking cokes watching Richard L., Paul and an Aboyne pilot downing Tequila slammers. Richard H. was taking photographs, while Derek (Rose’s crew) looked on in bemusement. I’d just passed Rose who was off for a cup of tea and bed, and Iain was in the bar claiming he was sober. Friday was forecast to be a 300 km day, and both Dominic and Jon wanted their Gold distances, while Rose and Iain had positions to defend.

On Friday I helped Jon rig, as Paul was nowhere to be seen. Surprisingly, Richard L. was up and about. The expected 300 km was set and we launched them, always a part I enjoy, seeing the grid off behind six tugs. Before the launching was finished Jon had landed out north of the airfield, despite Liz seeing his plight and marking a thermal for him. Paul had surfaced to see Jon off, and was now organising an aerotow retrieve, for although Jon had blown the competition day he could still try the flight for his Gold distance. The second attempt worked, Jon having pulled off on the first due to a wing drop. He was unable to avoid a small area of muck which sprayed his glider. This is where Paul redeemed himself, producing bucket, sponge and water to clean the glider. He found running with a wingtip not good for his hangover, and that evening was witnessed refusing alcohol. It was the best flying day of the week. All the Open Class got back, and all but four of the Sport. Dominic got his Gold distance, but felt he was slow and wanted to know how he could have flown that half-hour faster. Jon was too late for the 300 km but did two of the three TPs and returned unperturbed but with a bad back from the morning’s rigging.

And that was the end of the flying, as the last two days were scrubbed, but not the end of a lovely holiday. There was a good party in the hangar on Saturday. Tenterhooks for Iain and Rose on Sunday as we waited for the scrub decision, as he wanted to fly again to improve his position, now third overall, and Rose didn’t especially want to have to defend her first place. So Rose and Iain came away with trophies, as did Liz, getting one for best novice in the Sport Class having come eighth overall. We got home on Sunday evening to find that many of the threatened storms of the week had ended up at the Mynd, so we were fortunate with the weather. After all crewing isn’t nearly as much fun if there aren’t lovely summer days to laze in. Just as well they are good for flying as well.

The Rockpolishers came to the Mynd on the weekend of the 22^nd and 23^rd of May, and we were given wave tasks on both days. Since we came second in the league last year and could have won overall had we but taken a launch at Nympsfield, we were all very keen to do well this time.

Others will write about the weekend as a whole, but I want to share my flight on Sunday with you, which was a bit too exciting towards the end.

Richard Hinley asked if I would fancy sharing the Duo with him, at least for an exploratory flight. The conditions were strong wind from the west, low cloudbase well below 1000 feet, and shifting wave gaps visible to the east over Church Stretton. William Brewis in the Ventus 154 took a ‘penguin launch’ to test the water, and Chris Alldis in the tug reported good wave lift over Stretton. Richard and I decided to follow suit, and the tow launched us to the west, then levelled off and curled round east towards Stretton at about 300 feet across the airfield.

Once in the gap we started to climb and released at 1900 feet in very strong lift. Richard flew the climb and we soon reached 8000 feet QFE. The gap was large and kept open all the time, so we were not at all nervous about getting caught above cloud. There were very few other gaps, some towards the north and Shrewsbury, and a line of very small ones towards the northwest, which opened and closed as we watched them. The task called for a turn at Oswestry or Vyrnwy, but neither looked inviting as extensive travel above 8/8ths would be required. From 8000 feet there were no gaps visible to the west at all.

After an enjoyable cruise round in the sunshine we decided to descend and have some lunch. The western edge of the Stretton gap was just over 2 miles from the field, and Chris Alldis reported that cloudbase was about 800 feet, so I thought that the Duo would easily slip under the cloud at high speed for a ‘straight in’ approach, which I announced on the radio. I had about 95 knots as I passed under the edge, not enough in retrospect, and the field looked quite reachable. However I had not allowed for the sink in the lee of the Mynd, with a 35 knot headwind, it very soon became clear that we would not make it.

We turned left down the east gully at 300 feet, and the prospect ahead was not at all inviting. The lee sink continued so we would be down very soon, yet there were no obvious fields that jumped out at us. To make matters worse this would be my first field landing in the Duo, so a cool head was needed. Under these circumstances a second pair of eyes was very handy and Richard was the one who spotted a small west facing uphill meadow with unobstructed approach. I noticed a very slight change in the colour of the grass between the lower and upper part of the field, and correctly assumed that there was an invisible electric fence there, just where I would have liked to touch down.

It was too late for any changes of plan, so I eased the brakes in a little, and touched down just beyond the fence, cutting the wire with the tail boom as I did so. Unusually it was a steel wire, and thin steel posts supported it. Luckily we only hit the wire. Although I approached at 70 knots the slope soon stopped the glider and the ground run was only a few yards, leaving loads of overshoot to spare up the steep hill. The pasture was fairly smooth, so the landing itself was uneventful.

I have to admit to shaking a little as I got out, Richard seemed very cool, but the logger trace showed that we had had just over two minutes between turning away and landing, not long to sort out a field and land in it.

What did I do wrong to end up in the position? Firstly I failed to recognise that Plan B might be required, in other words the straight in approach to the field might not work under the circumstances, and, following on that train of thought, I would have had plenty of time during the descent from wave to have sorted out a field. One problem that is obvious in retrospect is that there was always going to be very little time between slipping under the cloud and landing somewhere, given that the area was all in sink in the lee of the Mynd, and that cloudbase was just 800 feet above the airfield and 1400 feet above the east valley.

Was I wrong to have attempted it at all, should I have foreseen the problem and headed for a safe field to the north of Stretton? Perhaps, but I was the first to attempt a return to the field on the day, and, had I planned for an alternative in case of failure it would have been a perfectly sound option. One other option would have been a let down in cloud over the valley to the west of the Mynd using GPS, but I am not at all keen on cloud flying, and the Duo’s airbrakes are not fully speed limiting, so I did not consider that one. Had there been even a small gap to the west I would have had a go, but there was nothing visible.

It was one of those experiences which will go down in the ‘I learned about flying from that…’ file in my head.

Listening to questions aired during lunch time chat on the whys and werefores of oxygen lack it seems that the Air Force’s teaching could supply some of the answers.

The basic standards were quite simple: over 10,000 feet ASL other than short periods, or over 12,500 feet ASL at all times, oxygen must be used.

The impact of oxygen lack was demonstrated to groups of three or four at a time in a decompression chamber (a claustrophobic business!). Each was armed with a pen and lined paper with instructions to write a repeated simple sentence on consecutive lines.

Pressure was reduced to 30,000 feet equivalent and then the victim’s oxygen supply was cut off. Almost immediately a deterioration in ability to cope became apparent and quite quickly he became unconscious and slumped forward at which point the oxygen was restored. Recovery was surprisingly rapid and the victim carried on writing as if nothing had happened. Only the evidence of incomprehensible scrawl could convince nine people out of ten that they had been unconscious for a brief period.

Clearly the best rate of climb that a glider can achieve will not produce a dramatic transition hence one of the of the questions raised at the lunch table - what are the symptoms of approaching anoxia. Individuals vary marginally but for the overwhelming majority the effect is very similar to slowly getting drunk and starts with a growing feeling of well being - a ‘Catch 22’ situation - you are convinced you are doing all right because you are not doing all right.

The advice is straightforward, operating above the recognised levels some degrading of performance and judgement is inevitable and you cannot be directly aware of it. Under these conditions oxygen supply should be on, the demand system meters the proportion of oxygen in the mix in response to the pressure in the cockpit. This looks after things unless you are planning to go over 37,000 feet ASL when neat oxygen is not enough to counter the pressure drop and the Air Force will be upset as you would be in their air space.

Users of a ‘constant flow’ system should be aware of the specified transition heights for their equipment and observe them (a recent couple of questions established at least some shortcomings).

Oxygen is possibly the unique aspect of flying where the use of judgement is not appropriate since it is judgement that is at issue.

The difference between the basis for a rattling good yarn and a tragedy can often be paper-thin; luckily this one turned out to be the former.

After last year’s trip to Hus Bos and a singular lack of gliding, we returned to Camphill where they have decided to make their Vintage Rally an annual event. The other saga alluded to in last year’s instalment had also been resolved and Blue Sky has a wonderful new trailer from Mr G. It is designed to last me and her as long as we are allowed to fly, and there is enough spare room to accommodate a homeless ME7 or two as well!

The Camphill organisation provided all the usual non-gliding and gliding entertainment: excellent food, good social events, and the game of chicken with the launch team to see how close to the wire you can stop and they will still launch one with you there! I had a check and a couple of flights, which were nothing special this time. Then on the Tuesday I was generally minding my own business at the north corner of the field where the Back Wall meets the ridge, thinking about having another launch.

A tractor was parked at the top, pointing down the slope roughly (but not quite; we will return to this later) parallel to the line of cars and in the vague direction of the parked gliders. It started to move slowly past me down the slope. Mistake number one: I was close enough to do something and I decided to try. (Don’t; just let it go.) I was thinking of trying to steer it away from the cars, gliders and people....... I think.

I approached it from the side, trying to reach the steering wheel. Mistake number two: that put me in front of a rear wheel. I tried a quick pull but with no effect. Things were getting rapidly out of hand; I was just in the process of getting out of the way when the rear wheel caught my feet, knocked me down and ran over me.

The main reason I am still living and in one piece is also why I had no effect on the path of the tractor (on the steering wheel; I don’t think it even changed direction when it ran over me): in order to minimise damage to their airfield, Camphill have fitted their tractors with very wide, low-pressure, ‘doughnut’ tyres, like big versions of those seen on Quad bikes, etc. They run at about 10 PSI and the downside is the steering is even heavier than normal. The upside is a large footprint on the ground and hence low pressure.

I appeared to be relatively unharmed, considering, as far as I could recall, that the back wheel had just run diagonally from left to right over feet, legs and lower rib cage. The tractor continued down the slope and was stopped by the front wing of a nearly-new Rover, whose alarm then went off. My knees and elbows were grazed and my ribs seemed rather more creaky than usual, but no other signs of serious damage.

A kind soul drove me back to the clubhouse, from where Ian Dunkley (the Rally organiser) took me to Buxton Hospital (this was his second trip of the week, someone earlier had hit his finger with a car jack whilst trying to undo the bolts on Ian’s tow hitch!). They have a ‘minor injuries’ A&E department which seemed to fit with that fact that I walked in under my own steam (but not with my statement that I had just been run over by a tractor). They could find no evidence of serious internal injuries and said that I had probably bruised or just cracked a rib; in either case the treatment was the same: pain killers, take occasional deep breaths, and if you start coughing up green stuff then consult your doctor.

Kind friends derigged Blue Sky for me that evening. The next day, not surprisingly, I didn’t feel like leaping up and flying first thing but I did have a pleasant half hour on the ridge at the end of the day in "Kinder Scout 2", Peter Teagle’s Sky, which made an interesting comparison with my own.

On Thursday we came home, as originally planned. I told my story to Roger and when he had stopped laughing he reminded me of the last tractor ‘incident’ which prompted the change to alternative vehicles at the Mynd. I have tried to tell this in the style of a rattling good yarn, but the message is deadly serious: safety in our sport is important not just in the air but also with all the complex and heavy equipment we use on the ground. I’ve been given a second chance; I hope no-one else has a similar experience.

Once again that time has arrived when we gather at the Mynd for what has become the annual social and flying event, Task Week. As we bask in the late August sunshine??? enjoying those most quintessential elements of summer, strawberries and cream, sunburn, wasps and the England middle order batting collapse, do you not stop to consider how this all began?

Now, for the first time, the story can be told in full and indeed has been committed to celluloid. So sit back, turn the page and read on......

A long time ago at a gliding club not very far away......

The galaxy is in turmoil. A trade war is about to break out following the announcement by Darth Murdoch that newspapers have had their day and that soon all news will be published on the internet only. Confusion reigns among the population of the third planet of an uninteresting yellow star located in the western spiral arm of the Milky Way galaxy as they are left wondering what they are going to wipe their bums on.

Featuring all your favourite characters:-

• Darth Harris (The tall one with the big shiny helmet)
• Nick Skywalker
• Gon Solo

And introducing master gliding instructor and his pigtailed apprentice Obi-Wan-Foster who appears as a white bearded old man in episode 4 which just goes to show what 3 years of instructing on the Mynd does to you.

Senator Bradley turned to General Rowson.

"The breakdown in communications can mean only one thing General."

"Aye, that’ll be Rose on the phone to Welsh Git again. They’ll be hours."

Gui-Qwon-Stuart and Obi-Wan-Foster regarded the semi-reclined, track suit and trainer clad figure playing with a holographic chess set in the background.

"That’s Her Majesty’s consort, Obi-Wan. Don’t be fooled by his laid back appearance. They say his wit is sharper than a Jedi light sabre," explained Gui-Qwon-Stuart.

"Master, is it so, that he has travelled to the farthest corners of the land of Cambria using nothing more than the power of The Wave?" enquired Obi-Wan-Foster.

"Obi-Wan, that’s what he says," replied Gui-Qwon-Stuart adding, "He is destined to become a legend in his own mind."

In the hangar C3PF regarded the assembled craft. "I can assure you they will never get me into one of those dreadful gliders," he commented in a tone of voice which wouldn’t sound out of place in a Shrewsbury courtroom.

"Boing boing ping plip," replied 92-B4.

Meanwhile the sinister form of Darth Harris’ Deathstar intergalactic battlestation hove into orbit, a formidable behemoth equipped with lasers, anti-matter particle disruptors, armaggedon photon rays, phasers, CD player, twin airbags and walnut veneer dashboard trim.

____________________

Filmed entirely on location in the caravan park and the dewpond.

Stunt pod racing sequence featuring Mike Stuart and Anakin Holmes.

Stunning computer generated special effects. (Thanks for the loan of the Playstation, Matty.)

"Screenplay and acting of this calibre is rare in contemporary cinema. The last time I saw so moving a portrayal of characters possessed of such depth and passion was some years ago while watching an old episode of Thunderbirds."

"The plot’s thinner than Darth Harris’ coiffure. The film was shot on location and the director should have been. This is set to spearhead the revival of the British sickbag industry."

"After you’ve seen it 27 times it starts to grow on you, like malignant melanoma!"

"Nice tits!"

On general release in the briefing room from 16th October. So start queuing now saddos!

It is almost exactly three years since the committee approved the idea of getting the club online with a web site. I remember in those days a certain amount of scepticism regarding its usefulness and whether it was money wisely spent. This seems a good time to review developments since August 1996.

The site was originally hosted on the Compuserve server (an array of powerful computers to which other computers connect via modems) with the club being a registered user. Compuserve then, however, proved to be slow and cumbersome and the URL (Universal Resource locator or web address) long, complicated and completely unmemorable. We took the step of moving the site to space available on my personal AOL account and allowing the club office to access the account for receiving email. This was quicker, easier, had a slightly better address and put the office online for the first time. Janet was able to receive and send email which speeded up the process of communication, particularly with potential course members from abroad.

In due course it became clear that the Mynd needed its own domain name (the unique URL that not only directs browsers to the site but reflects the name of the business) and we adopted longmynd.com. At first it was arranged that connections to longmynd.com were redirected to the AOL address, meaning that there were at least two ways of getting into our site. Quite a number of other clubs and gliding associated sites agreed to have links from their sites to ours and we reciprocated. Now there were literally dozens of ways of getting in. All the major search engines were informed of the site address but in the way that they do some of them recognised our presence, at least for a while, and others steadfastly refused to find us. This situation remains the same. Because of the explosion of the web some search engines now take more than six months to find a registered site and even then do not always add it to their data base.

Earlier this year we decided to put the club site on a wholly professional footing and moved it again to its own ISP (Internet Service Provider) which also provides full online dial up service and email services. At this point the URL became simply www.longmynd.com and the email address office@longmynd.com. The club is no longer dependent on me providing space on my personal account. At the same time the site was redesigned to accommodate much more information and make it easier to navigate. As the webmaster (the person who develops, designs, authors and publishes the pages on the site) I have had few complaints so I guess it works OK. The club and I personally have received a number of emails from outside suggesting that it is one of the best gliding sites in the UK so I believe that the club’s decision to get wired was entirely justified in terms of how we project to the outside world.

A straw poll amongst course members last year by Phil Foster suggested that about half of them had got their initial information about the club and holiday courses from the web. Jan gets up to twenty emails a week, many of them regarding courses. We get on average 140 visits to the web site each week, about 7,650 in total since the site started.

Recently Phil Foster has started his own excellent site devoted to images of life at the Mynd which compliments nicely the club site and both have links to each other. New features on the club site include Rockpolishers results, the Duty Rosta, appeals for Duty Swaps, a Members Classifieds page, and Weather Information links. The next feature I would like to develop is a listing of all members email addresses so if you are online send me a message so I can compile it.

Don’t forget to amend your bookmarks and favourites lists to point to: www.longmynd.com

and send email to: office@longmynd.com

Jon Hall

Midland Gliding Club

webmaster@webz.co.uk

01244 332766

I would like to thank everybody who did so much to make Task Week a success; Iain Evans for the weather forecasts, Nick Heriz-Smith for setting the tasks, Hazel Turner and Sue Holmes for running control, and everybody else who flew the tug, drove winches, pulled cables, listened for starts, watched the ridge or did any of the other jobs without which we would not have had such a successful week. And of course our thanks to the catering team who kept us fed at all sorts of odd hours.

Special thanks to Mick Davies who provided a tug from Cosford at very short notice when ours became unavailable.

Thanks also to those who lent spare GPS and loggers to the diminishing number of competitors not equipped. Luckily the promised jamming trials did not cause us any problems. I would like to hope that next year all competitors will be logging.

The full story should be told in the next issue, for now here are the results.

Note that 494 was at Lasham at the start of the week so could only compete at the end. On the last day Chris Alldis would have been second, Richard Langford would have been fourth if they had been competing not hors concours.

The week also produced three Silver distances and a Cross Country Diploma (part one, missing part 2 by less than 1kph).