Latest news by Ritz
November 1 2006
If this weather is what we are going to have this summer in Australia then it does n´t look too bad! It is 30 dgr. with strong thermals , even on the ground ( we had to clean the house after one tried to get through it and…..even lift it!)blue skies and nice fluffy high clouds.
Jo is doing a great job as the new correspondent for Australia. She send me a lot of info, but unfortunately I could not open all files. Hopefully the new site is ready soon and she can straight go in it with her news.Thanks Jo.Two of the items she has sent :
—–The Australian Gliding Museum was saddened by the passing of member Geoff Richardson on 3 August 2006, aged 92 years old. Geoff had started the designing and building of the Golden Eagle when he was 20, and this famous glider, first flown on 26 December 1937, is now the world’s oldest glider in regular use that is still airworthy. Geoff mixed his own casein glue as he was not satisfied with the products available at the time. —–
—–In the October 6 issue of the Australian Gliding Magazine, Terry Cubley looks back on the World comps Club class in Vinon. Enjoy the article in Soaring Australia and for our European and American readers here is a little summary.
“It was a pleasure to compete at Vinon. Without doubt, it is one of the better gliding sites available around the world. It is a great airfield, great management, beautiful mountain ranges, hot and dry weather (usually) with some marvellous scenery. Each day provides a huge variation in conditions, lift sources and excitement….
The landing options were actually quite good in most of the task area. Not a huge number of choices, but well marked with GPS co-ordinates and a booklet showing landing directions, etc…….
A high percentage of competitors were not carrying FLARM – there was some concern that it provided a competitive advantage (or disadvantage – you can’t hide from people). Our Australian FLARMs worked well, and appeared to have a better display than the European version. It certainly helped identify the club aircraft flying in the contest area….
The Europeans insist on start lines rather than the Australian multiple start points. This really supports team flying (which is banned in Australian competitions) as all members of the team can start together at the one point. As a result, we ended up with huge gaggles per-start, with in excess of 30 gliders…Most of this issue could be fixed with the multiple start point system…..
There were some excellent examples of team flying. The Poles, French and British teams were very good at it. The Austrians, Germans and Czechs were very good at sharing information, and although they weren’t together all of the time, could benefit from this exchange. These 6 teams took out almost all of the top 15 positions in the competition. There are benefits from information sharing and we Australians need to get better at this. “—–
Just send some info and pictures (made by Jo) to Marina Galetto for their site from the Junior World Gliding Championships.They will start with it soon and I will give you the adress to follow what´s happening there, as soon as I have it.
” For ever young,” a great song which I was playing in my van while cleaning,when the power was cut off here at the caravan site of Sportavia at 12 pm.Will never forget that. In the song you here quite often the word “madman”.Why did a pick that?????!!!! We got power back straight away , for 2 days only to sort out what really is going to happen. Leave you for the day. Ritz