OLC 2011! F 16 ‘s!

Alphen aan den Rijn   Wednesday October 20 2010      ritzdeluy@hotmail.com

Last weekend was superb!  It was not only blue , but there were even nice looking clouds. While travelling to Amsterdam however,  I noticed under those great skies 3 gliders at Valkenburg and they had difficulty enough to stay up.
Not when you were launched from  Soesterberg as Mark, one of the Dutch top pilots flew a nice 234 km distance this late in the year!! He enjoyed a cloud street going up from Mid Holland to the North East.
Daan , Sikko,Henk , Gert and more flew from Soesterberg as well, great-for-the-time-of-the-year-distances up to 381 km. Nice cloud streets , very clear but cold!!!!
Now we suffer from rain , wind up to 80 km/h on the coast , thunder and lightning and low temperatures with the possibility of WET SNOW!!!!!!. Welcome winter!

I read and was a bit down from the story of a young 26 year old man  who went for a joy-flight in Bayern , the southern part of Germany on that sunny sunday-afternoon. After trying to overcome the pilot, who defended himself while flying, he opened the door and “stepped”out. Suicide! The pilot had a lucky escape , for him it was still a good but a bit scary sunny afternoon, atleast he could repeat it.
Another pilot , Dutch this time and departing from Rotterdam,  showing around 2 people from South Africa,  during a joy-flight how beautiful Holland looks from above certainly on such a great day,  was just a tiny bit unlucky as well , due to an engine problem, which forced him to land at the beach. No body injured!The South Africans have a story to tell as well coming home.

I have always been interested in how “our ” tuggies got on in the world. From most of them I heard they have great jobs at airliners all over the world and a lot of them are captains now as well. Have n’t heard for a long time about James. But last weekend I got the message that James is also doing very well. I knew he flew for Air Malta in the past, but that all changed and James lives in Riga now flying for Baltic Air and he is also the chief instructor over there. Good on him.

The OLC has contributed a lot to our soaring world, no doubt about that. We know where our friends fly and are happy with them with their big achievements. Not everybody likes the fact that pilots just fly with the clouds to make the best distance , for that reason the OLC created the FAI OLC. For 2011 they even make it more interesting as on October 15 I read there foresight into the future.Read all about this ingenious combination of OLC Classic and OLC FAI triangle and the speed tasks at their site. [to the right where you find the scores and under latest news.] 

The new 2011 list of scores has started on October 12 with 72 flights. SUPER weather , “an other day in paradise “on the 16th of October in the USA where a pilot in a discus 2 flew a nearly 1200 km ridge-flight from Mifflin County.
A 935 km flight in an LS 3 from Blairstown is something to mention as well.
Also the pilots flying in Brasil at Luis Magalhaes were having great fun flying distances up to 835 km.

I loved the comment of a West Australian glider pilot flying 513  km FAI triangle  in a Hornet; “Eastern staters eat your heart out!”Indeed they DO have nice weather in the West and unfortunately they suffered badly from rain during the Nationals in the East. Heard from a friend in Perth that they enjoy 30 dgr. Good!!! 
Best flight last Sunday was from Cunderdin in WA with 765 km. in a DG 800 /18m. Yes it starts….the over-seas 2011 season!
On Monday Stephan had the best OLC flight from Tocumwal;350 km and 299 FAI. Son Aljoscha was practising thermal flying today.

Also in Bitterwasser.  The 7 containers have arrived safely, as well as the 2 for Pokweni. Their season can start now  too, but I read that had lot’s of thunderstorms. Somewhere in the middle of October the Gariep Dam soaring safari was supposed to start but till now I could not find any news about it to share with you.

Brussels Airlines, is certainly not the biggest airliner in the world not even from Belgium, but….there is something special. From 554 pilots, 52 are female!!!!! It still is only 10 % but not too bad, not too bad at all.
16 of the 52 are captain the rest is co-pilot. Brussels Airlines claims it is just co-incidence, pilots think that the equal way of treatment makes the success. [AD]

Winter still has to come but when you plan a 2011 summer soaring holiday in France  flying a competition in the mountains you can do so from July 6-16 with 4 practise days on July 2-3-4-5. Then the Coupe du Monde de vol a voile en montagne will be flown in Vinon. Classes; Open, 15 m , 2 seater and  18 m and  for the last 2 ,  these comps are the French Nationals  as well and for foreign pilots the registration will be limited for these 2 classes and will be on FFVV invitation only [ IGC ranking list] . Just to let you know already!

On the 6th of November the National Dutch Soaring day will be held at the airport of Volkel. Just this week a book will be presented from a military pilot telling us that during  the Cuba crises in 1962 , 52 nuclear type 28 bombs were in bunkers at Volkel. This type of bomb is 5 times more powerful as the one on Hiroshima .The book “Flirten met de dood”[ Flirt with death] written by one of the pilots Steve Netto, tells us that in the cold war period, 12 fighters were ready every day to start within 15 minutes with those deadly nucleaire bombs under them. The book will be on the market from Friday onwards and will be presented that day to the commodore of the airforce Jac Jansen, amongst 300 fighter pilots during a reunion. It seems , this is a public secret for years already, that there are still about 20 bombs at Volkel…  fitting under the F16’s  !! Of course where they are exactly, remains top secret. Interesting place to go to ,[ even Google Earth cannot find it as the organizing team from Volkel claims,] and to listen to what Dutch soaring did last year and is going to do next. Hope there will be A LOT of people!!!!
By the way , I ordered the book already!

Talking about this cold war with Russia in the past !!!!What happens on Tuesday at noon???? With really bad weather here in Holland with storm and heavy showers !!!! 2 F 16′ s this time not from Volkel but from Leeuwarden {up in the North} intercepted 2 Russian bombers from the type TU 95 MS , who had entered our space !!!!What they did here above the Nord sea?? No idea!! They  quickly disappeared, when they were intercepted. It seems that this is the 2d time in a short while that bombers from Russia, “visit” Europe as , Danish, British and German fighters had to intercept in the night of the 15th/16th  September as well.
It is NOT forbidden , as I heard, to fly over Europe for those Russian planes, but they have to use their radio!!! As the Dutch controllers could not reach them by radio, they were “accompanied”, till they left again. On their way to the UK again,  where they were warmly welcomed by the UK fighters .

Ireland has like a few more countries in Europe financial problems. Reason for Ryanair to try to take over Air Lingus again . They tried twice before, but political resistance stopped these plans. By the way Ryanair has already a 30 % interest  in Air Lingus!!

That’s about it.  By the way the verdict in the parachute-murder is tonight! A jury of 12 has to decide if Lady E has to go to prison for a life-long visit or will walk away free.
Looking forward to many long and interesting flights in both Africa and Australia.
Will be not there on Sunday  and next Wednesday, due to a 40thiest wedding party and visiting guests here. But if something interesting comes up before Saturday I will be back.

cheers Ritz

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