The White Stuff

Once again it seemed like a good idea to go to Bells Beach so I conned Curtis Greenwood into meeting me there, at least I would have someone else to talk to while we sat around willing it to come on.

Arrive at Bells, not on, not happy, Curtis turns up and at least I am not the only one to have wasted a day.

Anyway, off to Torquay for a leisurely lunch, one last look at launch before heading home, to our great surprise and pleasure it was on like a train, no going home, madly setting up.

By the time we have got half the battens in there was another half a dozen pilots there, including some prominent members of the coastal mafia, how do they know.

Moving a long, in the air with heaps of lift with some white stuff appearing around the vicinity of South Side becoming thicker as I was climbing at Point Addis, at this point there was some gaps and the ground was still quite visible.

On to Point Roadknight via Eumerrela where the white stuff was beginning to thicken and warning bells were beginning to tinkle ever so slightly which was a great shame as it was the easiest run from there to Lorne I have ever had, apart from the white stuff that is.

So, floating around Lorne making runs at Teddys Lookout and not making it due to the white stuff at 900 to 1,000 feet, by this time it had thickened considerably and the warning bells were letting out a resounding clang here and there, were they getting through, apparently not.

After several goes at getting around Teddys I was getting a little peeved, as there was heaps of lift and we were being stopped by the white stuff, so in a moment of exceptional clarity, I somehow decided that I could get a little more height than the white stuff said I should and get around, what could possibly go wrong.
This is what can go wrong.

Lorne has some quite large treed hills at the back of the town, these hills quite often being in cloud when the cloud bas is lower than 1,000 feet, we were hitting the clouds at around 900 to 1,000 feet, HELLO!!

Very shortly after I decided to get a little more height than was strictly safe, I lost sight of the ground, ocean and other gliders, still not that worried.

At this point I decided to keep an eye on the GPS to ensure I was flying straight and level out to sea where I would lose height and come out the bottom of the cloud, still not that worried.

In a very short space of time I started to notice some G forces that are not usually present in straight level flight, what’s going on I say to myself, upon checking the GPS I had the great misfortune to see the coast line as represented on said GPS was oscillating wildly through 180 degrees and completely disappeared at one stage, now extremely worried, almost to the point of brain lock, warning bells now deafening.

Having not experienced this level of disorientation before I had no idea what to do, briefly considered throwing a chute but disregarded that idea, thank heavens, my one good decision for the day.

All I could do was try to calm down and develop a planned response, sounds easy, its not.

Anyway, after what seemed like a long time of thinking, “how am I to get out of this one”.

I decided to poke my heart back down my throat as it was trying to do a runner, not surprising with the way I have been treating it lately and concentrate on the GPS to try and pre-empt the oscillations thereby keeping a general heading towards the coast, which worked to my great surprise and relief.

Eventually I popped out the bottom of the cloud a long behind Lorne and a fair way up the hills and was able to get my bearings, luckily there was enough lift to keep me in the air until I got back out to the beach for a landing, it still took 10 minutes to get there which gives and idea of how far back I was.

After landing and calming down I had a think about what had happened and came o a couple of conclusions, as follows.

Firstly, stay away from cloud, there is quite a lot on this subject in the Ops Manual, good reading.

Secondly, if you find yourself in any bad situation where the glider is still in one piece and flying, remain as calm as possible and continue to try and fly the glider out of the situation you are in, you have nothing to lose and a lot to gain.

Finally, I don’t think anyone will see me going near cloud again, the very thought now gives me a sick, cold clammy feeling that has nothing to do with the weather.

Good bye.