Scratchy!

A window in the weather had opened so a moderately early start on Sunday saw me arrive at the Devil's Dyke at 9am. To my surprise and relief, other hang gliders had started to rig. Weather reports hinted at rain in the afternoon and the wind was forecasted to drop, so I quickly rigged my short packed glider as to get the best of the day!

I assisted Chris T. off for the first time after his accident then returned to my glider and made my way to launch. The wind was very westerly and everyone in the air shared the same little bit of airspace directly in front of the pub. It was busy, but not to the extent that I felt uncomfortable, so I launched and joined the established circuit in the sky.

For the wind strength the air wasn't very buoyant and I struggled to maintain take-off height. After 10 minutes of beating back and forth battling gravity, I realised everyone else also struggled to gain sufficient height for a top landing. One by one, as the better skilled or pilots flying higher performance wings managed top landings, the airspace became less congested until myself and John, both flying Sting 3's, shared the air. One lonesome paraglider had joined us and a short distance above was a rigid wing.

For twenty further minutes I struggled to gain a necessary 120 ft ATO, an altitude that I felt comfortable attempting a top landing from, but eventually, as I headed away from the hill to avoid the somewhat confused flight path of the paraglider, I connected with something that took me to 150 ft ATO. With the necessary height, I dashed back to the bowl, turned downwind headed toward the paddock and began my approach. For a few desperate seconds I though I was going to land in the ditch between the earth works, but after I accelerated the glider, I penetrated forwards and gently touched down in the paddock.

With rain forecast and the wind much lightener I decided that was enough for me today. Watching everyone else fly turned out to be the source of some amusement. Ozzie landed in the bowl and came very close to a ground loop [we all heard him land]. Nicos amazed us when he disappeared below launch and we assumed he had bottom landed, only see him re-appear back above the hill after he had scratched his way back up. Not sure what Clive did, but I found him lying on top of his inverted glider in the paddock. After we unclipped him we, righted his glider.

Finally, when it started to rain at 13:15, I had assumed everyone had landed so you can imagine my surprise when I looked up from the rear car park to see glider very low, clipping trees before a very rough landing on the road that lead into the car park! I had been able to stop an approaching car moments before the glider landed. After I assisted said pilot off the road and to a secure area, I learned it was the pilot’s first top landing attempt! We’ve all done it!