Gliders and Lenticular Clouds

With some strong Northerly winds at high altitudes over Europe lately, we got the chance to see those massive clouds forming in mountainous areas.
Their impressive shape is the result from high altitude waves and they are a sign of exceptional soaring conditions for glider pilots.

Two weeks ago, a Belgian pilot took off from an airfield situated at the Belgian/Dutch border to land near the Spanish/French border a few hours later, covering over 1050 km (650 mi) without the use of an engine. A dozen flew circuits of up to 800 km in one go.

I was working around that time but got the chance to do a few flights in thermal soaring conditions (using lifts under Cumulus clouds), do a bit of formation flying and get back to stick-and-rudder flying, quite different from flying a swept-wing jet and probably more pleasant as well. 

I hope you will enjoy the video and the photos.

That's how addictive it gets, flying close to 100 hours per month for a living, flying as a passenger every week to commute back home and flying gliders on my days off.

April 27, 2012

7 hours in a glider above the Alps

As well as building my flying hours, I get to fly gliders every now and then and got the chance to do a 7 hr flight across the French Alps, flying a circuit of just over 300 km (160 nm), and a total flown distance of 660 km (350 nm).
We reached an altitude of 15,000ft in a very cold and dry air, using the waves as a mean of soaring. We could have climbed probably up to 20,000ft but it was just too cold.
Needless to say the view from such high altitudes is absolutely amazing!

The glider-towing is going well despite the quite challenging weather. I'm on my way to my 200th tow flight already.
The flying in itself is not difficult, what makes it interesting is the challenge to find a thermal (column of rising air) or release the glider on a ridge with upgoing air, usually surounded by dozens of gliders, most of which are difficult to see.
We use the gliding equivalent of the TCAS, called "Flarm", as a mean of detecting other gliders and tow planes in the area. It does not always work though.

When the airfield is wet (as it has been for the past few days), we use solely the short concrete strips to take-off .. and to land. Some landings look more like an aircraft-carrier landing, and it is possible to stop the plane within a hundred meters (330ft).
The fun begins when we release the glider and make a steep descending turn, well over 60° bank, descending between 2000 and 3000ft/min back to the airfield.
The soaring centre's activity is doubling from this week onwards, and will double again for the summer period.
I've been flying around 2 hours a day lately, which is quite good already, considering we fly pretty much everyday, whatever the weather does to us.

What usually means a "no-go" for a plane pilot, can actually be excellent for a glider pilot.
A strong wind creates waves with very good rates of climb (often well above 2000ft/min of rising air), as well as a rising air along a ridge. We set up a surface wind limit of 40 kts.
A big dark cloud is the place where you want to fly if you are a glider pilot, as those dark cumulus are the sign of a thermal. The darker and the bigger the cloud, the stronger the thermal.
Very interesting flying, and well fun!

Airborne life continues...

Maret 29, 2011

Mountain Flying

Hi everyone! I'm just back in sunny England after a short trip in the French Alps, and what an amazing trip! Indeed, I flew to Geneva (Switzerland) on friday, met some friends in Lyon and we drove all the way up to l'Alpe d'Huez (a ski resort) under some heavy snowfall. We met there a bunch of young pilots brought together under the association Jeunes-Ailes (literally, "Young Wings").

A bit worried at first, the gloomy foggy sky went away whilst we were skiing and we could finally enjoy a nice truly blue sky, although the temperature dropped close to -30°C (about -20°F) during the night in the upper part of the station.

I got to fly twice, in the nice Jodel D-140 Abeille (F-GJHU), and made a short video from the footage I took in flight :



I hope you like the pictures, probably the most beautiful I ever got to take, thanks to the awesome scenery!
There's a bit of everything, hard to comment them all but to sum it up, I took most of them on l'Alpe d'Huez altiport (at about 6500 ft altitude), which has a runway with a 15.5% slope and allows the random skier walking by to enjoy a superb scenery, covered in snow for the most part of the year.
I also managed to take a picture of 4 F16 and a KC135 Stratotanker from the USAF (US Air Force) overflying us at quite a high altitude. This is what I call a superb week-end!

Februari 02, 2010