My Flying

The first official flying day of the new year and it was looking yeechh!

I arrived at the airfield at 9 am and the clouds were low and it was drizzling lightly.

Anyways, we put the Twin together again, after it's long trek down from Gauteng, and waited for a gap in the weather to test fly her.

At around 12 pm the rain stopped and the Twin was aerotowed for a quick test flight from 08L.

As we had a tug, tug pilot and a spare instructor we decided that this was too good an opportunity to waste and most of us got some good aerotow experience in with the Blanik. I went up dual for my fourth ever aerotow and it went off very well. Back on the ground I asked if I could go solo and after a short chit-chat amongst the instructors I was given the go ahead.

The wind was very light and the air pretty dead so the aerotow was a breeze. I released at 1400 ft and played with some weak lift over the ridge getting to 1600 ft. After I few minutes I remember that there was a queue of people behind me also wanting to fly and I headed back to 16R. The landing was interesting and I was rather chuffed with myself when I managed to avoid a small dog running down the runway just as I was about to flare. I closed the brakes and ballooned over him before touching down nicely on the other side.

So what did I learn today. Firstly stay below the tug during the tow and don't out climb the tug during the take off. Secondly before releasing from the tug pull up gently to get some tension on the rope then release, that way you help to avoid the rope come back and hitting the glider. Thirdly try to watch out for unexpected happenings on the runway during finals.

Excellent day at R60 for flying and R250 for aerotows.