That's the outcome of having a 'glider' add-on rating to a power licence. They only need an absolute minimum of hours before they can take rides. When I flew there, I was allowed to take the controls, after briefing the pilot on my experience (L2 instructor etc.) There was an offshore wind unfortunately, so no ridge soaring anyway, but there were thermals and we went whale watching over the bay. When I asked the pilot if I could try a spin, he gave an emphatic and terrified 'negative' followed by a lecture of the ' vicious spin characteristics' of the 2-33. When it was time to return, he flew the whole circuit at 80mph. When I asked why, he said the 'Vicious spin characteristics' of the glider required it. I reckon he had never spun anything in his life.
-----Original Message----- From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Mark Newton Sent: Thursday, 25 December 2014 2:08 PM To: Discussion of issues relating to Soaring in Australia. Subject: Re: [Aus-soaring] : Hawaiian Pawnee tug in the drink On 24 Dec 2014, at 10:11 pm, Peter (PCS3) <[email protected]> wrote: > > Great place to ridge soar unless the vog is blown in from the Big Island volcano. f/vog like when we were there. The ridge is parallel and about a klm from the runway. I visited in 2008. The commercial operation there has a clause in their ops manual saying they can't ridge soar, which was a bit disappointing. I suppose you could as a private owner, but there's no club as such. The "joyflights" are carried out by people with little or no gliding experience: Aerotow to 5000', float down, land. I didn't get the impression that the pilots knew or cared much about thermalling, the one I flew with was sensitive to unusual attitudes and got nervous when I slowed to thermalling speed, and didn't want to know about flying close to the rocks. Bit of a waste of a good site. It'd be great in a northerly! - mark _______________________________________________ Aus-soaring mailing list [email protected] To check or change subscription details, visit: http://lists.internode.on.net/mailman/listinfo/aus-soaring _______________________________________________ Aus-soaring mailing list [email protected] To check or change subscription details, visit: http://lists.internode.on.net/mailman/listinfo/aus-soaring
