Crestline Soaring Society

Speaking of suck... that's what Marshall has been the past several days. Haven't heard any reports about Elsinore lately.

This was sent to me:

>
> Paraglider survives after soaring to 32,000 feet
> Woman awakens encased in ice after going higher than Mount Everest
>
>
> • Glider lives through thunderstorm
> Feb. 16: A paraglider lives to tell her story of being swept up into the
> atmosphere during a thunder and lightning storm. MSNBC.com's Dara Brown
> reports.
> MSNBC.com
>
> CANBERRA, Australia - A German paraglider was encased in ice and blacked
> out after being sucked into a tornado-like thunderstorm in Australia and
> carried to a height greater than Mount Everest. She survived.
>
> “The glider kept climbing, climbing and I couldn’t see anything," recalled
> Ewa Wisnerska. "Then it got dark."
>
> The 2005 World Cup winner was lifted 32,612 feet (9,940 meters) above sea
> level by the storm near Manilla in New South Wales state while preparing
> for the tenth FAI World Paragliding Championships next week.
>
> Story continues below ↓
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> advertisement
>
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> A 42-year-old Chinese paraglider, He Zhongpin, was killed by the same
> weather system, apparently from a lack of oxygen and extreme cold, the
> organizers said. His body was found on Thursday 47 miles from his launch
> site.
>
> “You can’t imagine the power. You feel like nothing, like a leaf from a
> tree going up,” Wisnerska told Australian Broadcasting Corp. radio on
> Friday.
>
> “I was shaking all the time. The last thing I remember it was dark, I
> could hear lightning all around me.”
>
> 'No oxygen' in the death zone
> Wisnerska, a member of the German team, had been carried to a height
> greater than the 29,035-foot Mount Everest — an area known to mountaineers
> as the death zone for its extreme cold — in just 10 minutes and was
> rendered unconscious for almost an hour.
>
> She encountered hailstones the size of oranges, and the temperature
> plummeted to minus 58 Fahrenheit.
>
> “There’s no oxygen. She could have suffered brain damage. But she came to
> again at a height of 6,900 meters with ice all over her body and slowly
> descended herself,” said Godfrey Wenness, one of Australia’s most
> experienced paraglider pilots.
>
> Wisnerska was admitted to hospital with severe frostbite and blistering to
> her face and ears, but has since been released.
>
> She had been trying to fly around the rapidly developing storm front, but
> became trapped when two storm cells merged, Wenness said.
>
> Sudden severe thunderstorms are common during the Australian summer and
> come with destructive hail, winds and torrential rain.
>
> Wisnerska, whose flight was tracked by her personal GPS and computer,
> landed 40 miles from her launch site.
>
> A British team member earlier this month survived an attack by two wild
> eagles which sent her canopy plummeting while flying in the same area
> ahead of the championships.
>
> Reuters and The Associated Press contributed to this report