Crestline Soaring Society
Serving Hang Gliding and Paragliding in the San Bernardino Mountains
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Marshall, Fri. 2 May 08Switching to onshore after a couple of days of light offshore winds. I decided I'd take my chances from the 750 and then hike back up to get my truck, for the exercise. I launched my Falcon 225 from the 750 at 13:10 and sank to the bluffs. Saw the flags at the LZ pointing to the SE and I found the thermal east of the LZ at 300 AGL. At 13:25 I was at about 8000 MSL. Flew out toward Little Mountain but found large areas of >700 FPM sink, so back to the hill. Gliders were launching from Marshall during this period; one had taken off and skied out just before I launched. I chased a weak one up to Cloud Peak, and once it got above there it turned on like a rocket. I was seeing 1000 FPM on my vario's averager with 1400 FPM peaks. It was cold at 8800! Flew to Pine and climbed some more, to 9000 before I just got too damn cold - short-sleeves, no gloves, white fingers that stayed dented when I let go of the basetube. I dove down to Marshall to get warm; flew all the way to the radio towers and found big sink again. Got to 8000 off Marshall and flew out across the freeway and RR tracks, well into Muscoy, then towards Devore and back to the LZ to land after 2 hours of flight. The flags went limp as I was setting up my approach and I got dumped during round-out; flared but the glider still sank, and I slid in on the basetube wheels and my right calf. Still, best flight of the year! As I was breaking down the Falcon several of the other pilots came in to land. All were ebullient with tales of altitude and points visited. Dave Aldrich flew well into Cajon Pass, Kenny Westfall took his rigid wing out over Rialto, etc. The hike up to the 750 wasn't bad. (My vario said I got to 8800 MSL, but my GPS said I got to 9032. The GPS had my launch and landing altitudes dead on, so I'm goin' with the GPS.) GPS track images and flight gory details on my website. Good Flying, Forums > Pilot Reports Flight > HG Sites > Marshall OH WOW!Years ago Bill Cosby told a story about wanting a car that went 200 mph. When it was delivered he got in and looked at the speedometer which said 180, 190 and then the words “OH WOW!” As for Fri. 2 May 08… OH WOW! Several HG’s waited for the wind to come up slope at Marshall and when it did it was up, up, up. For awhile the wind blew from the south up the front of Marshall and from the north over the back. Rob threw some handfuls of dirt in the air and you could see it swirl. As I walked down to launch I saw the wind sock do some complete 360’s. Really, it was sticking straight out and it went all the way around in a couple of seconds. Does that mean what I think it does? (Coriolis would be relieved to know it was spinning counter clockwise.) John W launched first and showed the way, he was a little dot in the sky a few minutes later. Others followed and exploits abounded. May we have some more please! Mike Z yepGreat day. I made it to the Cajon Pass for the first time today. Great fun! Pictures and flight report: http://www.hanggliding.org/viewtopic.php?t=6672 -Dave ConcurrenceLast wing off of Marshall of the first bunch. Gliders were specked out soon after they would take off. Self launched turned right and flew into sink. Craig on his falcon was below me struggling. Flew to the west getting lower when my vario lit up. Hung a left |
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The day I'd been looking for
I bummed a ride up early to work on a video project (and the SD card needed formatting so the video was corrupted, among other things blah). Thanks for the ride, Kenny.
Marshall was the killing fields as the winds switched from North to East and back and forth. My wing got tipped by the wind when it was on the basetube with the velcro still on the wings. Then, even with a good wireman, I got turtled by a dust devil at the launch point, as winds went from 5 mph East to 15 mph West in a matter of seconds.
Thanks Rob and Dan for the help.
It was worth it.
10 minutes later I was at 8k. It seemed like there was a lot of lift and a lot of suck, so I didn't take my Falcon too far afield, as some did in their new sport 2s (**cough** Dave ** I-15** cough ** cough**). I guess my acrobatics on launch were scary: it took quite a while for everyone to launch after I did.
After 2 1/2 hours, my shoulders were sore, my hands cold, and my day complete.
Here are some pics:
Bracing for impact
Face down, *** up, that's the way we like to be ****ed.
Here's a view of a wing you don't see often
Decent shot of the wings on Marshall
Look and you can see the wings on Marshall
Lakes and Launch
Just Arrowhead
Tracklog