Alphen aan den Rijn Wednesday November 9 2011
www.soaring.eu www.glidinginternational.com www.soaringcafe.com
Gliding International;November/December 2011
The November/December issue from Gliding International was on my mat when I arrived home from 2-days-Amsterdam yesterday. The “no compromise-glider” , an add from Schempp-Hirth on the last page of the GI, looked at me.
I quickly sat down to read the magazine.
Interesting as always and a lot to read. I liked the story about another South African Project by Fritz Johl; he claims that a 1000 km. triangle is possible in 5 hours in a J-5 with 15 m. wingspan!!!! [see picture on cover of GI.]
Still a “fully functional quarter-scale model” at this stage….but it looks it will fly in the future…..read more in the latest GI.
ALSO….Klaus Ohlmanns 2138 km. straight distance flight…..Soaring Safaris with Dick Bradley from Bloemfontein, a selfmade flyingwing sailplane from Estonia and much , much more…..62 pages of reading-pleasure !!!!
www.glidinginternational.com
My longtime friend Gerrit [Holland]travelled years ago to Tocumwal,got to know his wife Pam [UK] over there, both visited Australia often to soar then moved down under and now they still live, work and fly there. Pam is even the very active president of the Darling Downs Soaring Club and this club just bought a brandnew Duodiscus XL. Here is the story send to me by Jo. Thanks Jo!
And…Good luck with the new plane; Happy flights and safe landings!
http://www.thechronicle.com.au/story/2011/11/07/club-rapt-new-glider/
More news from Jo about high-flying, grandma’s! Here is the link to that story when you are interested;
http://www.frasercoastchronicle.com.au/story/2011/11/08/club-preparing-for-takeoff/
Several friends have arrived at their overseas destinations in both South Africa and Namibia and in Corowa [Australia] ; you can see the first flights already on the OLC. And lots more will follow, I am sure about that!
A bit of rain in Corowa but flights will follow soon as the containers have been unpacked and checked.
Botswana, topped the OLC on Monday with a flight of 868 km. in a Nimbus 3D, in it ,a great 823 km FAI triangle.
A German pilot ” found” Orapa, the town in the middle of the Central District of Botswana in Africa. A town well known for it’s diamond mines, the largest in the world!
The gliding-field is on the main airport of Orapa. Later the pilot changed the name of airfield to Ntwetew. I have never been in that area, but found out that this place provides water for the diamond mines due to the Mopipi Dam. Interesting!!!! Anyway whatever field he started…it was a nice flight!
Yesterday more nice flights from Namibia and SA. Distances between 600 and 800-plus were only made by open class gliders and one by the 20m. Antares. One of our Dutch pilots is in Gariep Dam. Max had a nice comment:” Struggling for 5 hours against the wind is very rewarding when finally the groundspeed on the way back hits 330km/h.” .I look forward to nice long flights from Hans and Uwe as well, both fly from Gariep.
In my last blog I mentioned the weather. It is still “weird”! The South of France was hit this time as a very unusual tropical depression had settled above the Mediterranean sea. Last time this happened was in 1995. The East coast from Spain and the South from France were hit badly by rain[ in a short time more rain fell then in 3 months, causing flooding from the rivers!] and storms with up to 100 km./ h bft.. My son in law arrived home 3 days earlier then planned from his bike trip through Spain. Horrible weather!
Off to Schiphol now to pick up Maria, who arrives soon. Take care. CU Ritz