This morning we arrived at the airport not only to east winds but also to complete overcast! I may have stirred some excitement when I opened my trailer but quickly any observers realized that it was only to retrieve my coat from the cockpit of Kate. However when I went into the terminal building, Randy Acree made a remark to Mike the Strike about the overcast and he responded matter-of-factly that it would burn off by noon and that we would soar today. With that we returned to the trailer and rigged the glider.
The meeting was quick and to the point. The overcast would burn off by noon, the wind should shift around to at least south, and hopefully we would then be on or west of the demarcation line between stable air and good soaring conditions. A 2 hr TAT was set for the Sports Class. The FAI’s had the same task but with 2.5 hrs. There was a fire TFR in one corner of the 1st turn area that had us all spending some time with our maps and the route gave us the option to throw away 100 points on the day by flying over or through the Albuquerque Class C.
We gridded at 12:45, the sniffer launched, and actually managed to climb to 9000. We were put on standby for the launch to start and most of us on the grid were probably really surprised that we were actually going to go flying. But then the sniffer couldn’t get another climb and in fact never got back above 8500 I believe. Just as a reminder Moriarty is at 6200. Tom had decided on a criteria of having the sniffer get above 9000 twice to start the launch and for us to be climbing above 12,000 before opening the gate. As the afternoon wore on we were quickly being worked into a corner. The NOTAM closing the airport ended at 3 PM and it takes about 1hr 20 minutes to launch all 4 classes. So at 1:40 with the sniffer still not above 9000 the day was cancelled. But then it was decided that hey if the sniffer could find a climb maybe just the sports class could get launched. He got close to 9000 again and the first 7 gliders in Sports were launched, but still no one was able to break the 9000 foot mark and most of the climbs were very slow. The sniffer landed at one point and took another flight to keep searching. A few of the sports class gliders did land back but most were able to soar, just not get very high. Finally at about 2:45 the day was cancelled. We had tried as hard as possible to make a day of it. A few guys still took tows and I have no idea how high the lift eventually went.
Looks like we could have some soaring weather tomorrow. Saturday is still apparently looking to be a good Moriarty day. I’m hoping for two more good racing days to finish up the contest.
