My Flying

A funny sign, but true in life as well.

The day starts off cold and with light rain; a phone call to the airfield confirms that the weather is not good. So that's no flying for today.

This morning I was up there all alone in the Falke on a beautiful calm sunny winter's morning doing a long circuit (waiting for all the traffic to clear) and I had a moment to take a breath, study the country side and enjoy the experience and I thought to myself: "damn, this is what it's all about." It's moments like that that make all the frustration and other problems associated with club glider tuition all worthwhile.

A year and a half of driving every weekend to the club, often not to fly, and today I was doing my 4th and 5th solo flights in the Falke. Dang, it is good!

The wind was breathless and 08L was the runway in use. A nice flight with instructor F(2) practicing some banked power on and power off stalls, three circuits and then two solo circuits. 45 minutes later = 197ZAR.

In South Africa gliding is controlled by the SSSA, Soaring Society of South Africa. They regulate and control all aspects of gliding and are basically completely autonomous from the CAA.

To be able to fly a glider in SA you need to be a member of a gliding club recognised by the SSSA. This ensures that the club operates according to SSSA regulations and guidelines.

Traditionally glider training, at a gliding club, has been provided free of charge and the only requirement has been that you are a paid up member of a gliding club and that you contribute some of your time to the club.

Thus the training is essentially "free".

But what are the advantages and disadvantages of this free training?
Here they are from my personal point of view as a student:

Read more »

Today was our first day of Saturday flying, and it was rather disappointing. There were only three people at the airfield, myself, the instructor F(4) and the winch driver. The balance of the duty crew didn't bother to show and I'm sure they'll use the fact that the Twin is out of action as an excuse. The fact however remains that there are still the club's single gliders to fly.

I flew the Falke for 25 minutes with the instructor performing five landings. Even though I was a little rusty from not having flown this aircraft for five weeks I thought everything went off well. He was upsetting my rhythm a little by making me turn finals rather high and insisting I flair higher than what I'm normally used to. This made for some deep and bouncy landings.

Anyways, back on the ground he wasn't happy that I fly alone. This I thought rather unusual and on querying why, his answer was simply, "I'm a difficult man to please". At a minimum I would have appreciated an explanation and some reasons. Cost = 121ZAR.

This has prompted me to write a short article on the pros and cons of learning to flying gliders in South Africa, coming up soon.