A Day at the Club

If the weather forecast is promising, members will be arriving early. After putting your name on the flying ‘arrivals list’ the first job is to open the hangar doors, and help to get the gliders out. Then enjoy your breakfast, Sven & Hayley provide everything from a simple roll to a “bumper” cooked breakfast, guaranteed to set you up for a day on the airfield.

The Duty Instructor will give the daily briefing at 08:30 including safety, airspace and any relevant NOTAMs as well as the weather forecast and planned operations for the day, such as which launch run we will use and who’s doing what in which glider.

Each glider is inspected carefully each morning before being taken to the launch point, this is the Daily Inspection or “DI”, batteries and parachutes are also checked and taken to each glider. Meanwhile the duty tug pilot and winch driver will be doing their own ”DI” getting ready for their day.

Then it’s time to fly! All the ‘kit’ is taken out to the launchpoint, with the tower positioned according to the run in use. The duty instructor will start at the top of the ‘arrivals list’ –so there is a real incentive to get to the club early. At weekends you can pre-book instruction slots using an on-line booking system. Together with introductory flights, courses and other instruction (such as cadets) there may be 5 or 6 dual seat gliders being used for instruction all day.

The cross-country gliders will form their own ‘grid’, on a good day there could be 40 gliders lined up ready to go! When it’s time to launch they get priority over everything else so they can depart as a group.

If conditions are right our enthusiastic owners of vintage gliders will bring out their delightful aircraft, in some cases over 70 years old, but kept in perfect flying condition.

The launchpoint is a hive of activity, with everyone playing a role helping to ensure efficient and safe operations under the guidance of the Duty Instructor. On our busiest days we achieve 100 flights or more!

Whilst most flight training takes place close to the airfield, the cross-country pilots can cover enormous distances. It is not unusual to reach as far as the coast of East Anglia, the Isle of Wight, South West to Devon, maybe Wales or North to Yorkshire. The average distance is about 300km and the record is over 1000km!

Towards the end of the afternoon the cross-country gliders will be returning, often at high speed, releasing their water ballast before landing. Flying can continue up to sunset, often a really enjoyable time to be in the air.

At the end of the day everything is packed away (yes they go in backwards), and we relax with a drink, swapping stories of the day’s adventures and achievements.