I was simply making an estimate of the wind speed. Since I seldom fly in windy conditions, my judgment may have been off. I don't recall anyone having a wind gauge set up so wind speed verification would be difficult. I based my assumption on the fact that most gliders coming off tow were simply hovering into the wind and it took them the entire time they were airborn (from two to eight minutes) to beat upwind the 100 yards necessary to close on the landing zone. If any thermal turns were attempted, the trip became even longer. In fact, RES or other light wing loading gliders were sometimes seen disappearing downwind unless they were pushing into the wind. Since the flying speed of most gliders at min sink is in the range from 10-20 knots, I thought that was a reasonable estimation of the wind speed. There was certainly no intent to exaggerate.
Obviously there's a huge difference between the difficulty of landing in a head wind or tail wind even if it's less than 10 knots. IAC, whether it was 5 or 15 knots, the landing conditions were definitely difficult and the fact that Skip was able to cope as he did is certainly testimony to his proficiency. Fred RCSE-List facilities provided by Model Airplane News. Send "subscribe" and "unsubscribe" requests to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
