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Completion of Safety Flight – 1 Jun 2014
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Club Phone – 630-9640
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Entrance Code – #6693
Columbus to Blair
After our highly regarded club member, Jerry Adams, called my Moron Trail cross country flight INSANE, I was thinking we should establish a cross country camp for our club members with little or no experience in flying a glider cross country, i.e. further away from the airport than gliding distance in still air and at the same time qualify our club members for a Silver Badge leg or two if not all three! For those members with no power plane experience I would suggest that a minimum qualification would be to have completed the Bronze Badge requirements!
So, this coming Spring I will set up a cross country camp in Columbus, Ne! The idea is that I will travel to Columbus Airport with the Jantar and the tow plane. Obviously I hope my wife Tammie will join me in this endeavor! We should arrive in Columbus either the night before or the early morning of our cross country attempt! I will hold class as one of the few who has any experience in flying a glider cross country among our club members. I will not fly other than the tow plane and to act as an observer for the many attempts at the Silver Badge I can foresee.
The distance from OLU to BTA is 55nm or 101kms or 63 statute miles, which is beyond Silver Badge requirements, depending on how high of a tow you’d feel comfortable with! If we get a good day we may be able to knock off the other two requirements for the Silver Badge as well, a 3000′ gain after release and a duration of 5 hrs after release!
We will hold class in pilotage, navigation with a sectional, glide distance and technique in soaring distances! I will have the Jantar available to any qualified club member together with trailer and crew for eventual retrieve! With the Jantar comes a NANO GPS recorder and declaration on a laptop computer. I would expect to see all four Russias’ crew members on hand with flying partners and trailers and retrieval crews. I could only wish for the Blanik L-23 and instructor to be available as well. This would have to depend on whether we can get our Blanik L-13 trailer modified in time for this excursion.
Cannot think of an easier first attempt of cross country flying with simple navigation along the Platte River and Ne Highway 30, passing the towns of Schuyler, Rogers, North Bend, Ames and Fremont. Once over Fremont then you should be able to see Arlington and then Blair (BTA)!
With best wishes for a fantastic soaring season, Bert
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