A strange day will dawn...

It's a bit hard to get a feel for what's going to happen this weekend. Unusually the wind is going to go around to the South East from the NE...usually we get SE winds after a low or front. The RASP is forecasting 4-5000ft thermals from Tauranga/Waikato down towards the central Plateau and upto 11,000ft over Mt Ruapehu. Upper SE winds will be strong-ish (at 5000ft maybe 20plus knots).

At this early stage I'm going with the NOAA squiggle line forecast (below) of blue thermals upto 6-7000ft in the late afternoon. However I don't really care cos I'm off to Wellywood for a GNZ meeting. Have fun in the sun...

Here's an excellent fundraising idea...

Fly high with Richie McCaw - http://www.trademe.co.nz/Sports/Rugby-league/Other/auction-327861136.htm

It's only been going for a few hours and already it's upto $1100.

The Labour weekend winner was....

Bruce Little in GKM. Out did the rest of us by miles...

And about time too...

It gets worse...

It actually looked do-able at 12 O'Clock.

Enthusiasm ensued, GNM and GYR got dragged down to the launch point. In record time pre-take off checks were completed, the rope was attached and off we go...at 1500ft I realised we were wasting our time...we hit cloud base at 2000ft on tow and I released at 2500ft, above cloud base. A quick dask out towards Poripori in the hope of getting past the sea breeze...things were still crap.

Only thing left to do...fly home and do a high speed beat-up - sorry - competition finish and over-shoot - land and drink tea and tell lies - best part of the day actually...solved all the club's problems AND I was suitably chastised for the quality of the weather forecasting...fair enough it was total bollocks.

All dressed up with nowhere to go...

I polished GNM last night, I had water on board, food, drinking water, a way of disposing of surplus orange juice, task loaded and then this happened. It not only happened to me but GKM as well...

3 hours of not much...

It was blue...it had an inversion...it was hazy...it was light SW...it didn't have a sea breeze...so I spent 2-3 hours trying to get out of the zone...and it didn't look any better anywhere else.

Saturday 6.30am

Go south, not north. Get going before the sea breeze (11am). SE will be better than SW. Go up not down...always do good things not bad...never put a sock in a toaster...sorry I'm losing my marbles. It doesn't look as good as I thought earler in the week but should still be fun. Not a 500km day.

Looking a bit shaky...

So what happened to day. There was plenty of wind up high (and on the ground mid-morning at the farm). Looks like bases were 6500ft or so. As predicted the afternoon got better but will probably finish early. First graph shows today at 3pm.

NOAA are forecasting a blue day for Saturday with high cloud??? I'm not so sure. The RASP forecast has moderate thermals through to 5500-8000ft depending on the terrain. The winds will be less than 15 knots below 8000ft

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Check out the forecast convergence lines...sea breeze around the BoP and hawkes. Convergence from Taupo up to the North. Excellent.

Interesting data...

I've had over 2000 hits on the blog site in the last 2 months. Almost all from NZ...so it's not Chinese spammers...although the 2 hits from Azerbaijan could be...

Friday 22/10/10

Interesting. Will the wind drop off enought to allow things to get going? Forecast is for 20 degrees about the Bay. If the wind drops below about 25 knots and the temp gets up above 20, then expect cloud bases of 6500ft and good climbs. Maybe a bit of over-development around the higher country (Mamuku's, Kaimai's etc). I'd expect bases above 7500ft over the high country east of Taupo.

500kms day on Saturday...

Still looking good.

For those who want to have a practise day Friday should be quite good. If I get time I'll post a forecast tonight for Friday and a long range one for the weekend. At this point I'm picking Saturday to be the best.

Will we always get what we have always got????

With the likelihood of a beautiful weekend (sunny weather, light SW winds and a departing southerly airmass providing high cloud bases) we here in Tauranga are splashing out and doing what we always do...the same as we have always done...a few trial flights and the PW5's doing a few 10 minute flights. Pity really, we could have encouraged some of our newer pilots (and more timid older pilots) to travel over the hill to Piako to experience gliding on the ridge, without ATC nonsense, and with other likeminded pilots. I'd even offered to provide some supervision...but no. So we'll continue to get what we have experienced now for 10 years...a slowly declining membership. HOWEVER...the weather for the weekend looks good...gliders out, wings polished, pee bags installed, GPS on, camera's loaded, and away we go...

Yeah well...it was too good to be true...

Probably jumped the gun forecasting Monday's weather last night. Looking out the window it looks like crap and I'm guessing there is too much mositure around from yesterday's rain to allow things to get going. But I could always do a more typical glider pilot forecast...tell everyone what the day is going to do at 5pm after it's happened..."I could tell it was going to overdevelop cos my kiwifruit plants were pointing west this morning..." or some such story. However - looking way, way out to Labour weekend - it could be a boomer. Update - 1.30pm. So I got it totally wrong. It's now very windy and trying to rain. Not sure why both the NOAA Upper Air data and the RASP forecasts called it so badly. They were still calling a reasonable day at 6am this morning. First time I've struck them to be so far out line...oh well. Tuesday looks poor. Maybe late wednesday afternoon if the front clears quickly otherwise read a book time again. Wait for Friday-Sunday I'd suggest. If I can get my club to remove it's finger we might get a few club aircraft over to Piako Sat/Sun. But I would hold your collect breath...it seems mucking around in controlled airspace doing sledge rides is more TGC's cup of tea...the graphs further down the page illustrate the point...

Wouldn't you know it...

Monday is looking better and better.. Taupo bases of 7500ft and inland from Tauranga - 5500ft. There will be strong-ish westerlies. What a day...bugger, I'm busy.

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Some interesting information...

It's always good to go back and look how the club is utilising it's assets (gliders and tow-planes) and think about how that should shape the future.

We are lucky to have a club member who beavers away at the data collected on the time-sheets. Maybe the rest of us are too busy to apply our minds to the changing environment in which the club operates except as we walk through the door to a club meeting.

Things are changing and will change again as the expensive "bit of kit" (otherwise called a duo discus) turns up late this year.

What might this be telling us? Possibly that two tow planes are a luxury and 4 two seat gliders are as well.

Monday

Yip...everyone has gone back to work and Monday looks OK. Strong thermals to 5-6000ft over most of the Nth IS and upto 7500ft in the high country. Typical...

Weekend Weather

Saturday...probably a good training day. Cloud base will probably stop anyone going far. Weak thermals dying early in the afternoon. Sunday - training for a training day...go read a book.

I see they found the missing helicopter...sad out come. Can I suggest to CAA that we carry stamped addressed postcards (instead of $1000 EPIRBs) and when we crash we mail these off to you...that way SAR might find us faster. It would be even cheaper if CAA brought everyone a Spot, paid the annual fee and we used those instead.

Helicopter goes missing...

I hope they find it and the 2 crew. They have been searching since late yesterday. However weren't these expensive EPIRB things suppose to solve these problems??? Remember all the hype..."have an accident and SAR can locate you immediately". I'm not sure what CAA's definition of "immediate" is but 24 hours seems not to be it!!! I also notice a report from CAA that now admits they don't work as well as they suggested...aerials break off on impact, the impact switches fail to activate etc. So to all the glider owners who spent $800 each and the powered guys who spent much more, maybe an apology...yeah right. I also note that CAA still won't support Flight Following Technology...pity because instead of searching over 1000 square kms this morning they would be down to 10 square kms.

These RASP thingy's are getting better...

I'm starting to get the hang of these forecasts.

We owe some thanks to David and Mats for getting them going. We are now getting higher resolution forecasts 2 days out. Excellent stuff.

As always you have to use the forecasts often, make a prediction and then monitor it to see how close you were...

The map here show easterly wave...interesting stuff.

What is it about Gliding Contests and Rain...

I thought we had it bad here in "The Land of the Long White Cloud"...(read Nimbostratus) but spare a thought for the occupants of the Big Brown out west. It looks like the Ozzie Nationals have managed 2 days out of 7 so far, and this is after the NSW State Champs were totally washed out 3 weeks ago. 3 eager Kiwi's have made the trip to the Land plagued with things that bite (sorry the Land Downunder)...a bit disappointing for them. I've been to the site for the Nationals (Dalby...it would make Omarama look postively humming with things to do when you can't glide).

To sum up...

The day was as forecast. Crappy wave on the Tauranga side...in fact I didn't bother trying to use the wave to across the Kaimai's but followed a cloud street across. A cloud street who's bases were 4500ft (as forecast). Wind was generally 250 degrees - 15-20 knots. good ridge day with streets and thermals. The best street took us from south of the road crossing all the way out past Tirau without needing to turn, and we climbed 500ft to boot.

Lets have another go...

Sunday 10th.

Cloud base upto 5000ft. Some high cloud may bugger things up a bit. Westerlies, westerlies and more westerlies...at all levels. Not increasing with hieght all that much...so maybe broken messy wave on our side but good ridge lift on the other side.

Oh...and to those wonderful people who told me late yesterday (I could have told you Saturday was going to be ok) hind-sight is 20/20...trying forecasting a day out so people can get orgaised...

I could have been slightly wrong...

As unusual as that seems...

I'm in Taupo at present...the clouds are clearing, light westerlies.

Sunday still looks better.

By 4pm today I should be able to score a contest using SeeYou scoring software...or I'll be totally confused...

9th/10th October

This weekend. Saturday - sleep in, go shopping, wash the car, do anything except go gliding. Or you could get the club wax polisher out and shine up an aircraft. I'm off to Taupo to learn how to use SeeYou to score contests. Sunday - maybe, sort of, could be...the rain will have passed, there will be a westerly increasing with height (wave), but I suspect there will be some showers around and the lower airmass will be too unstable to support reasonable wave. Maybe tow to the ridge and try for an early season 300km. Kaimai Rd summit, Thames, Te Poi, Hikutaia home...all at less than 3000ft at 100knots

Helping Maurice...

To win the Trophy for the best flight in a club glider...just like last year...

Maurice GKM is the red track...GNM is the blue one

The Valley of Death beckoned but....

I fought off the temptation to glide out towards Tokoroa...(the Valley of Death being Atiamuri). It was a lovely day...cloud bases of 5500-6000ft (damn I'm getting good at this forecasting...if I say so myself). A large convergence out towards the East. First flight of the season in the Discus...the picture shows all the kiwifruit towards Te Puke.The light green is Gold Kiwifruit and the browner stuff is Haywood...the poor cousin.

Sunday 3 Oct

So how did yesterday shape up? The westerly stayed stronger than forecast...certainly no chance of a sea breeze. It was blue as predicted

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Today; all the indications are thermals to 5000ft, cloud development, some over-development, and sea breezes. It feels like a day that will start out good but care will be required to avoid big areas of cold over-development accompanied by showers. I think the Waikato will be better than the BoP. Taupo looks to be fairly poor close to the lake and only so so on the higher ground to the east. I'm picking a Tokoroa, maybe Whakamaru day with the real chance of landing out around Atiamuri.

Saturday Forecast

The stars are in alinement...cloud bases at 4500ft around our part of the world. Light SW winds and maybe a sea breeze. Only trouble is it might be blue.

The weekend will be fly-ible...

or is that glider-ible, or soarable, or in my case forget-able. It's been 5 months since I glidered-id (well you form the plural of the verb...glidering???). However for the first time since Julia Gillard became PM of the West Island this weekend will be worth getting out of bed for...(for gliding not Julia). I'll need a check flight... Better forecast up tonight...