KnumbKnuts the Lawn Dart
A good flying day goes easy on a n00bie
Thu Jan 25, 2007 9:34 pm
[  Mood: Happy ]
A mid-January day at Marshall in San Bernardino, CA, is not a prime candidate for a good flying day. Two weeks ago, there was snow on the LZ. More days than not, Santa Ana winds blow out the hill.
Today was a good day.
The winds were blowing the wrong direction all over the southland, but they were right on for Marshall. I was up at four to get some work done, drove two hours inland to Palm Springs... an hour past San Berdoo, fixed a client's problem in record time, and came barreling back. I got to the LZ a little after noon and loaded my van up with two para pilots and a new friend named Mark, who is back in the sport after some flying in the 70s.
The Marshall road in winter, with ruts and brush, was almost too much for my loaded down Quest. Looks like the paint will need a few ... err quite a few... scratches buffed out. But it was worth it to know that I could get up there in a minivan... in the land of the Superflous Hummer.
Here's Mark Launching on a relatively clear day for the LA Basin...
So, for the first time with no instructor anywhere near... as a matter of fact, with nobody else left on launch, I launched.
What a fun ride. I kinda caught a couple of thermals and juiced the ride a little bit, though I need to fly more smoothly to work those thermals. I landed well without the VASI, a little short due to the winds coming across the LZ. The VASI is described here: http://flytandem.com/vasi/vasi.htm. It is one of the many engineering improvements to our LZ made by my instructor.
Anyway, I had one wing a bit low so I ran it out instead of gunning for the perfect flare... so much for the Mary Lou Retton training at Dockweiler yesterday. But, it beats a bent bar somewhere on my bird.
Here's a nice pic of a nice guy named Wayne flying over my shiny new Falcon at the Marshall launch.
Back to real life tomorrow for at least the next week.    
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sg
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Joined: 17 Jul 2006
Posts: 11030
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 Posted: Fri Jan 26, 2007 8:52 am Post subject: |
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Make it a habit to always have someone watch you launch, even if its a stranger who is just walking by. Remember, launching/landing is when you are most likely to get injured. If you blow a launch and are 200 feet below the hill injured, there better be someone there dialing 911 or you may be waiting a very very very long time for someone to notice.
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knumbknuts
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Joined: 05 Dec 2006
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Location: Carlsbad, CA
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Posted: Fri Jan 26, 2007 9:27 am Post subject: |
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Good advice... Mark and a PG pilot (in the pic above) were babysitting from the air... and the WW guys and my instructor were due up in about 20 minutes... but the other guy is about the same level as I, so....
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sg
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Joined: 17 Jul 2006
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Posted: Fri Jan 26, 2007 2:01 pm Post subject: |
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I was once at the top of a mountain where a H2 without sign off for this launch was preparing to fly. He had to have an H4 observe his launch at this site. He was not allowed to launch alone without a sign off.
So I was ready to launch long before him, and was patiently waiting for him to go first.
He said, go ahead, ill be fine, not a big deal, done this many times before. He felt bad because he was so slow to setup his falcon, and kept trying to convince me to go ahead and launch without him.
Good thing I was stubborn and waited. He blew his launch, ground looped into the side of the hill, and got flung up and hung up on top of his glider in all the wires.
He literally could not move and was just stuck there in a very awkward position. I was the last guy down that day. He could have been stuck like that over night 
Only thing injured was his pride and the broken leading edge on his falcon and torn sail.
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