[Editor’s note:  we want to thank our friend Gerhard for sharing this first flight report with us at the Soaring Cafe. More about this important milestone can be found here at the Alexander Schleicher website.]

Dear Friends,

We just got home from the Wasserkuppe with a collection of excellent photos from the ASH 30 Mi maiden flight, which took place on April 7, 2011 from the Wasserkuppe mountain.

The weather conditions were quite tricky with strong northwesterly winds and considerable turbulence scattered from buildings and pine trees upwind. So only one flight took place from a quarter past noon to exactly 1:30 PM.

We show three air-to-air photos taken by Manfred Muench from the ASK 21 Mi chase plane. You can see Martin Heide in the front seat and Peter Kremer in the rear seat. In one of the other photos you can see OSTIV-President Professor Loek M. M. Boermans and Gerhard Waibel, and in the other, Edgar Kremer and GW.

Both chase pilots and test pilots report good maneuverability with a pleasantly fast roll rate. Despite the wing stiffness while bending, the flight was quite comfortable even in the turbulent air, which caused trouble for the tow planes landing back on the Wasserkuppe. So, instead of many short flights, Martin and Peter made an extended flight in streeting thermals only 500 meters above the mountain while simulating all flight configurations and inciting flutter manually in addition to the strong natural incitation by the strong turbulence.

The big span ASH 30 Mi made a fine landing after the first flight and has been polished for display at the AERO-Fair at Friedrichshafen next week ( April 13th through 16th).

Kind regards from Hindelang,

Gerhard Waibel