Winter time started last night and it was visible this morning as frost coloured my car white! We even had MINUS 10 dgr. in the East from Holland. But today started sunny and dry!!!
Better then the East coast from the USA were I hope my friends who are living there, will have NO problems with ” terrible and ugly SANDY”. Officials are not so much scared for the power of Sandy , but even more for the magnitude from the storm, ready to hit not only New York, Delaware and Virginia, but most parts of the East coast.
And I also hope my friends living at Hawaii will be save for the tsunami on it’s way to the islands after the 7.7 earth quake in the ocean West from Canada, close to the Queen Charlotte Islands! That did not sound too good when I heard the mayor of Honolulu this morning on the news, while waiting for disaster , forecasted by the tsunami -forecasts- center, to hit .
The last flights from pilots loving their soaring even under colder circumstances are a fact. One of our former invited Belgium helpers at the field in Tocumwal Bert , had a nealy 100 km. flight in his Libelle , AND the first outlanding in the new season, or the last from the old season.
—“Anyway a nice flight for october, strong northerly with fast developping cu, heavy sink in between and difficult climbs, some between 2 cu. In the east there were lots of lenticular clouds. An as a bonus: the first outlanding of the new season.–”
He flew together with Belgium blogger Neil who never flew cross country SO late in the season.
Most pilots in Europe have their gliders in trailers now in the hangars. Also our friend Robert Danewid from Sweden de-rigged his glider after a last lovely day.
picture courtesy Robert via FB.
Summer time has started on the other site of the world. It’s getting warmer in New Zealand and Australia and from Dieter, who is one week in Tocumwal now, I heard it is a pleasant 24 dgr. after a pretty cold windy week. Love getting pictures from Toc., so I share 2 from them with you; the famous Murray River and the Glider on the pole , a piece of history now.The glider is “made” from several parts from several gliders and was in the past the eye-catcher from Sportavia, but still nowadays, shows people travelling through town, that there is soaring at the airfield. They are rebuilding the Tourist Information Center behind the glider, as you can see.
To the left the beautiful Anitique shop from my friend Lynne .
Pictures courtesy Dieter Albrecht.
We are looking ahead at 2 Qualifying FAI Grand Prix. One in South Africa in Potchefstroom from November 2 till 10 and a week later from Lake Keepit in Australia [november 12 to 18] . The weather in SA has improved , I heard after the heavy hail storms with huge hail stones close to Potchefstroom last week, colouring the road white.[see pictures on www.soaring.eu]
Chapeau for James Cooper flying his SZD 55 from Cunderdin in Western Australia yesterday, in great spring weather over a 600 km. FAI triangle [total amount of kilometers; 626.]
Also pilots from the Negev Gliding Center flying from Beer Sheba Teyba in Israel had some good over 300 km. flights!
Fantastic to hear that there is a lot of interest in the book from Sebastian Kawa, “SKY FULL OF HEAT” , which is not out yet but in pre-sale “goes like a rocket”.
You can see a preview on the authors web page at; www.skyfullofheat.com, you can order the book via www.glidinginternational.com
Also the book NIET VOOR PILOTEN from Dutch former Red Bull Air Racer and glider pilot, nowadays also a well known key-note-speaker Frank Versteegh, sells” like sweet bread rolls “, as they call it in Holland. Frank will travel next month to San Fransisco to promote the book in the USA on November 13 and when it is also out in English I will tell you and have an interview with him. You can read more about him on ; http://www.aerobatics.nl/
For all the other news you can visit www.soaring.eu
CU next week.
cheers Ritz
