Crestline Soaring Society

Fire season is here. Be carefull!!!!

Image taken from air on 9-5-06. The clean up of Hwy 18 closed due to tanker spill.

Launched Crestline on Monday 9/4/2006 after after 6pm. Wind speed was under 17 MPH. Crazy weather day with massive thunder storms, rain from Big Bear starting around 11:00 a.m. all the way to Crestline for a good part of the day. Traffic was a mess with all the closed roads, bad weather, and holiday traffic. I flew over HWY 18, and checked out the tanker spill a few times on Monday evening around sunset.

6 Sep 06, 06:40 - Highway 18 OPEN
Closure no longer listed at http://www.caltrans.ca.gov

Highway 18 is closed at 40th St. due to an overturned tanker truck and fuel spill. It could be closed for a week. With the closure at 40th Street, there is no access to Marshall Peak. One could get to Crestline via Cajon Pass and Hwy. 138, but that's well over an hour, LZ to launch (in normal traffic conditions).

Short Version:
Crestline. Launch. Climb. Strawberry. 7600. Smoke. Land.

Longer Version:
Similar to Saturday, but stronger base wind. Gusting to around 20 at Crestline. I launched a Sport 2 155 at 14:51, did a few passes over launch, and then was at 6350 at 14:58. Headed to the Interchange, climbed to 6800, then the next spine, got to 6900. Went to the spine out in front of Strawberry Peak, but the wind was blowing the cores apart. I kept getting lone circles of 100-200 up, and eventually dipped down below 6000 while working back west of the Cliffhanger. Decided to run out the spine on the east side of Waterman Canyon and see if I could catch a nice core that I could climb with for a long time while it drifted toward Strawberry. At 15:25 was at 5200 over Arrowhead Peak vicinity and 9 minutes later was at 7700 over Strawberry, thermalling with a Moyes topless. That thermal was 300-600 FPM for the most part; it weakened at about 7k and I really had to hunt to stay with the core, but then it picked up again - weak inversion?

This poor guy has a kinked fuel line, and lands on FWY onramp. His A&P mechanic buddy fixes the machine and he gets permission to take back off. He forgets to turn on the fuel tap and has an aborted takeoff after he gets a few feet off the ground. The FAA official smacks him on the back, the fuel tap is turned back on and he takes off correctly the second time.
Video at this link if you scroll down a bit:

A very sad day for many people.

Emergency or 911?

Tell the dispatcher the Airpark location is:

Andy Jackson Airpark
6191 N Badger Canyon
San Bernardino, CA 92407

(not for mail)