It’s the week of the long distances!
Looking back at the 1.300 km. race , I received the next message:
“Chris Woolley’s amazing 1250 Km flight from Kingaroy to Tocumwal via Dirranbandi on Friday 17/1/14 has resulted in a 1250 Km badge claim, 1 Continental Record claim, and several Australian National Record claims in 18m and Open Class.
Chris in Tocumwal in front of Eddies hangar.
Courtesy picture; http://sportaviationtocumwal.blogspot.nl/
AND,…a very nice comment from Harry Medlicott one of Australia’s grand old men in soaring via Jo.
” Hi All,
My heartiest congratulations to Chris Woolley for his magnificent flight from Kingaroy to Tocumwal. He very much improved on the record I had held for 14 years and Ingo Renner who had held it for about the previous 20 years.
Records are made to be broken and it is very pleasing to see mine broken by Chris, who all regard as not only a good pilot but a very decent person
Harry Medlicott
Harry must be “far” in his 70thiest now but still flies, nowadays in his ARCUS M , with his lovely wife Wendy.
Not bad either as he flew recently, a new Aussie 2-seater speed record from 140.67 km./h over 300 km. in Corowa on January 16 !!!
Good on them and I can assure you they belong to the nicest couples in Australian Soaring!
Talking about Ingo….Not so long ago I told you about the president of the Riverina Gliding Club in Tocumwal.He and his mates are all from former Yugoslavia.
Look at how they “use” PR tools.
Sunday 19/1/2014 they wrote;
” SRGC was visited by Montenegrian National TV presenter Mrs Dragana Mrkic. She had wonderful flight with our CFI Ingo Renner.”
Still very active ” our ” Ingo!
Picture shared by the club.
Talking about 1.300 km. It nearly happened again this time a TRIANGLE and just not 1.300 but 1.256 [FAI triangle 1.207 km] by John Coutts from Douglas Backhound. Speed 138 km./h.
Another record for the Dutch boys Max now flying with Edo also from Douglas in Max Nimbus 4DM;
” Declared 1000km Out & Return @ 145 kmh. New Dutch Open Class Record!”
They extended the flight to 1.252 km.
It’s the week of the OVER 1.200 km. flights!
Great picture shared by Max during the 1000 km. O&R.
Yesterday they did not fly! Reason???
Have a look at the shared picture by Max.
The shower started out of the blue within 1 hour Max mentioned. Great picture!
Edo in front of the Nimbus 4DM and ” A CLOUD”!!!!
Brigitte and Joergen from Denmark enjoy good soaring from Stonefield but had a bad experience with the fires as well, which luckily turned out not too bad. You are on a nice, joyful soaring holiday and then fires come close and scare the hell out of you.
I know that feeling so good from when the Tocumwal airport was nearly hit by the fires and we feared for the old WW2 hangar with lot’s of gliders in it and no time to get them out, only the glider from Bruce Brockhoff who worked like hell , sweat on the face, it was about 45 dgr. and when he was ready to leave he could go nowhere as the streets around the hangar were surrounded by fire.
Then the wind turned and only the east side of the airfield was damaged. Tragic enough anyhow, as lot’s of animals got killed. Those fires close by are HORRIBLE!!!!
Here is the story from Joergen about their soaring holiday and I share it with their permission:
” Birgitte and I are enjoying the Australian summer and our nice new Arcus.
We have set a couple of new Danish records, dual seater 20 m. A 100 FAI speed triangle with a speed of 177,7 km/h, and a 300 FAI triangle with a speed of 145 km/h.
The 100 task speed also surpass the open class record.
The evening January 17, we got a message from the emergency unit, that the house position at Konrads address was in danger of wild fire during the night, so we should prepare evacuation. Our Australian neighbors packed and escaped.
We packed our car with our belongings, and watched the development.
Luckily the wind did not turn to the south, so at 1 am we could go to rest, as the fire also started dying. Sadly a few homes were lost.
During the day we flew a short flight of 400 as a gust storm was predicted in the afternoon. We flew from one bush fire to the other, I have attached a few pictures from Renmark and further south of “Pyro cumulus” from the fires.”
After Stonefield they travel to Tocumwal to finish their Aussie holiday.
A good day for Kuruman yesterday where some of my friends spend their overseas time . A few 1000 km. tasks were flown.
To finish the blog some memories on that great EGC in Finland from Rayskala in 2005, where on day 1 a 1000 km. task was set by CD Silva, and……was flown by more than half the open class pilots.
On the picture Silva is in the middle [ with Katja behind him] and to his right is one person, Jorma, who ‘ s finger is out of line; that was the “boss’ at that time from Rayskala and as far as I remember the deputy CD then. To the right the president of the jury Peter and to the left the chief steward Dick and I was to the right of him as steward.
Maybe you don’t believe it ,….the the other picture is a glider on tow. Some pilots [I remember from the UK] straight away pulled up the wheel. Some , I was one of them, found that risky.
Great pictures from one of my favorite photographers Kai and placed in Rayskala -EFRY.
With the Aussie hat tuggy Kari and behind him [l] Visa Matti.
And,…no not a wheels-up- landing from a glider, but a launch.
By clicking on the picture it will be enlarged.
That’s it , great to see Stephan back in Toc. as well as Jochen!
Cheers Ritz
On Wednesday January 22 2014