Sunday, September 27, 2009

Day 7 AZ Flats

With light and variable winds they called for a 60 mile triangle landing back at the resort. I set up my glider and staged in a good spot near the front of the line. Once off of tow, I found a weak but steady climb up to the main gaggle and loitered for about 10 minutes. Getting really thirsty I reached for my camelback but couldn't find it. I flew away from the gaggle for clearance and tried to figure out what was wrong. I soon realized it was probably down in my harness and that I would have to land to sort it out. It was still 15 or 20 minutes before the first start and with the weak conditions I figured nobody would take it; so I spiraled down quickly.


On the ground again I sorted out the problem and towed back up. Somewhere in that 10 minutes conditions turned on and most people took the first start. This left Trevor and me working up together with Lucas coming back to join us.

Just before the first turnpoint I found a climb that eventually turned on and I took it up to over 10,300ft. I didn't really need to go that high but I wanted to take the T2 over 10k just one more time. Making the turnpoint was easy after that. Just after the turnpoint I met back up with Lucas, Ricker, and Trevor. This was the first time the "Lookout boys" were flying together. It was fun.


We separtated on that glide until it was just Lucas and I. We were on courseline and were going good when our driver came over the radio and warned us to avoid an airport that had busy skydiving traffic. It was right in front of me within glide. I looked up to see the jump plane gaining altitude above us. Not sure what to do, I veared to the east to go around it. Getting low now we were in trouble. Lucas stayed more west of me and I headed over to a prison complex hoping there would be some heat coming off.


I arrived with about 1,000ft and found a very small, broken climb. For about 10 minutes I struggled over the prison watching people in the yard playing basketball. I kept thinking of the irony. I am free like a bird, and they are caged in the desert, but we still wanted the same thing; to climb away from this place.


After fighting for a while I was slowly losing altitude. I realized I only had a few more minutes of flight and this was the last one on my wing. So, I stuffed the bar, gained good speed, then let it out for a huge wingover. Afterwards I set up an approach and landed next to the road. It was an awesome final flight.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Fyi air space over any prison is restricted. They really frown on circling over top thinking you might be dropping something in. I landed next to the parking lot of a prison a couple years ago and got a lot of company. They were cool but suggested I keep more distance next time. The big maple leaf on my glider may have helped my cause. Hopefully I will be back to join you there next year!

Rob Clarkson

Eric said...

Thanks for the info Rob. I guess I was hoping to find one and get out quickly. They warned us about that at Big Spring. Lots of prisons around there.