SEN 2719
- Missing a max
- Way back mess up
- Knocked on the Head
- Out of the Woods
Messing a max
From: Allard van Wallene
Missing a max
I think I also have a nice one.
It happened in Sezimovo Usti World Cup. Must have been some 10 years ago. Also here, tall grass was in play and when reeling out my towline I normally do a RDT check by pressing the ‘delay button’. The RDT unit was normally velcro’d around my wrist but not this time. I must have dropped it in the high grass. Trying to find it was mission impossible. As I had a spare unit, I took my losses and continued my flights. After a nice string of maxes my glider was climbing nicely in round 7 heading for a clean score, when some 90 seconds into the flight the model DT’d. What the..? My friends told me there was a lost and found somewhere near the food stand and I went there to check if my RDT unit was found. There it was, lying on the table. I asked the organiser when it was found and apparently someone dropped it off during the last ground. You can do the math.
Allard
Way back mess up
From:hermann andresen
There were even more ways to botch a flight when Wakefield required wingtip and prop ROG.
Editor’s Comment: … We did make a effort to keep that alive by coming up with the prop delay – tricky with a mechanical timer, bit better with electronic timer.
Knocked on the Head
From:Ross Jahnke
Ken Bauer reminded me of an incident involving John Lorbiecki over 30 years ago. We were flying at Bong and there was a group of hang glider enthusiasts on the field as well. They were annoyed that our flightline was along the gravel road they wanted to tow from, and we were annoyed that they didn’t move (our event was sanctioned theirs wasn’t). John was towing an F1A as a hang glider pilot rolled slowly through the flight line with his fully assembled glider in the back of his pickup. The tip of the hang glider clipped John in the back of the head and knocked him forward. He sommersalted still holding onto the towline, got up and continued towing and managed to launch successfully. I can’t remember if he maxed, but I’d love to hear John’s rendition of the flight.
Out of the Woods
From:gilbert morris
Adding to Ken’s history stories, years ago while flying F1C at a Bong, Wisconsin contest, my plane flew deep into a woods. I was using a home made beeper that only sensed volume, not direction. The volume was varying so I figured some one had it and was moving around. With an enormous belch I yelled “airplane”. and what do you know out comes a guy on horseback carrying my plane. He said he didn’t know we could fly in the woods. I said, ya we do it all the time. Years passed and it dawned on me he must have thought we fly in the woods like it was radio controlled. I’ve always wanted to get back to that guy and explain what I meant. This is my chance.
Gil