The 1996 Firle record of Steve Cook

JUST WHEN YOU THOUGHT YOU HAD READ ABOUT THE FIRLE RECORD It's smashed again! Steve Cook tells us how he did it
1990 and the Firle record was 32 miles by Ray Sedgewick
on an Ace Sport which lasted until 1995 when Ian
Blackmore did 54 miles on a paraglider and landed at mid-day due to very turbulent conditions and a full bladder.
This flight proved that Firle was the site to crack off the big cross countries and sure enough later that year Tony Lucchesi chalked up a nice little 59 miler taking the record back for hang gliders on an an Xtralite 137 but Ian's flight still looked very impressive.
1996 and the 3rd attempt of April sees Johnny Carr landing just short of the record, I land in the New Forest for 77 miles and the new record for about 20 minutes. Tony got a climb and manages 82 miles, this was going to be a hard one to beat..but not impossible.
May 6th 1996, the forecast looked pretty average - moderate NE with a band of cloud spreading up from the south. I didn't bother getting up until 9.30 (lazy git) and looked out of the window, blue sky - nice puffy white little cumulus popping!! - f**k...! I got dressed and loaded the glider at the same time, no time for breakfast. Littlehampton to Firle usually takes an hour but today I arrived at Firle after 40 minutes with probably half a dozen speeding tickets.
The wind was smack on but it looked as if the sea breeze wasn't far away but the gliders were skying out, I started rigging up as quick as possible. Tony arrived, running with his glider - "got up late did we? only a right punter would do that!" We finished rigging just as the gliders fell out of the sky - typical- the wind then picked up and went off to the east, the sea breeze was mixing in, making the thermals broken and rough. Tim Cox took off and managed to get up from the trig point, John Hewitt took off and started to scratch along the ridge.
Tony and I waited for better air and watched Finn Kennedy on his paraglider fly straight into the quarry at ridge height - well dodgy. I launched at 12 noon followed by Tony and we glided straight off to the trig point, John started to climb and I joined him in a 2-3 up, found a better core and climbed out. Tony joined me and we waffled over the back, a good cloud was forming above us and the thermal increased to a steady 5-up,
I climbed through John and arrived at base just north of Newhaven.
The sea breeze convergence was coming in from the east and the sky to the west looked a bit flat, I topped out on the leading edge of the cloud and headed off for the leeside of Iford were there was a weak cloud.
I reached Woodingdean at 2500amsl 8-down on the glide which didn't help much but some weak lift appeared, but I needed a strong climb otherwise in this wind I would end up going over Brighton low and stuck on the coast with nowhere to glide.
I headed north to a gully at Moulsecombe where I spotted a seagull circling at the north end, I arrived at 900 agl to find only a broken 1 up which I was losing height in - poxy bird!
With not a lot of options left, I suicide glided back into the houses and connected with a 3 up, Tony and John were to the south at about 2000amsl in a weak climb. Tony tried to glide to me but got hammered and had to land on the racecourse.
John flew over Brighton low, risky, my thermal accelerated to an 8-up and I reached base over the West Pier, a cloud formed north of Hove and I legged it over there - 10-down sink on the glide bang 8-up to base.
I could see John had managed to get to the north side of the town and had landed safely. I stayed with the cloud so I could glide over Shoreham airport, a cloud formed to the west of the runway and I arrived there at 4500amsl and climbed to base.
Good clouds had formed on the lee side of the Storrington ridge, again 8-10 down followed by 8-up back to base. Another glide inland would be good but it was blue to the NW and clouds were forming to the SW so I headed to Arundel. I picked up a weak climb which broke up before base so I headed for a better looking piece of sky towards Chichester.
After a long sinky glide I reached some clouds but there was only weak lift which normally I could have worked but the drift to the coast was quite strong so I headed to the NW to a good looking thermal trigger and arrived at 2000amsl, 8 up appeared (lovely jubbly!) and back to base at 6200amsl. This gave me safe crossing height for Chichester airport.
Good clouds had been forming along the M27 which seemed to be augmented, a sea breeze setting off the thermals along the road, but there was no convergence.
I reached Havant at base, now with some airspace problems, a danger area at Portsdown, small but from the surface to 6600 and cloud base wasn't high enough to cross overit so I crossed theA3(M) and glided north west in 10-down sink followed by a bout of free fall off the clock plummeting 4000ft in seconds followed by 4-up, the glider making some strange noises and a sh#t load of Gs pulled, a turbulent 8-up back to base at 63OOamsl, Portsdown now out of the way.

The wind was too strong at height to go north around Southampton - l5mph at base coupled with 10 down sink on the glides equals bomb out. So a track between Fareham ATZ and Southampton airport and try to cross the Solent estuary at Hamble, I glided along the M27 working weak lift to stay as high as possible as I could see smoke from an oil refinery chimney blowing towards the north, showing the sea breeze had already cut inland, also the sky was blue.

At this point it looked as if the flight might be all over, my only chance was to get high and glide over the estuary and head inland. I ended up 2 miles south of Hamble at 3500amsl. I couldn't cross here as a landing the other side would be a certainty and so I headed north up the estuary, working weak lift on the way. I waited on the east side for around 10 minutes until a reasonable core came along - 3-up.

I waffled across watching the ferries below, the smoke from their chimneys was going north, I was drifting south, the sea breeze was very close below me so the next glide would have to be inland, I kept watching the sky, trying to work out where the sea breeze might be. Luckily some flecks of convergence formed to the east giving me a rough idea of where the leading edge was, it seemed as if the slope angle was very shallow and so a NNW glide would be in order towards Ashurst.

I left the weak lift at around 4000amsl and immediately hit 5 down, then the air became rough and then a smooth 3 down. I was in the sea air, so I changed my heading directly north and pulled on to 40mph hoping my glide was better than the angle of the sea breeze front.

Down to l800agl the air got rough, back on the edge of the sea air again, I kept heading north finding some weak lift, but nothing was going up.

Now on the edge of the New Forest the tree line seemed to be an obvious trigger, down to about 1000ft the glider nosed down.and got sucked in to the mother of all thermals - an off the clock boomer, three turns gained me over 500ft and I was soon back at base at 6700amsl - the record was now within a glide. I drifted for a while enjoying the view and then glided west to a good cloud.

Bournemouth airport was in the way but another climb to base sorted that out. Some convergence formed to the west of the runway so I headed over there and waffled around working the weak lift. The sky inland seemed to be shutting down and the sea breeze had come in with a vengance over Poole harbour and had gone miles inland. In a vain attempt to find more lift I headed inland in a NW direction but the air was smooth and smelt of seaweed, bollocks, it was game over yet again and the sea breeze had won.

I landed in a field so big you could land a jumbo jet in it, well these Toplesses do glide well. The wind was light south east, a farmer came over and had a chat and then I went off to get retrieved.

Glider:Topless 147 (it's a motorbike)
Vario:Davron 700 (a small white box that beeps)
Harness: Stealth
Strongest Lift: Mega
Strongest Sink: Loads
Distance:98 miles
TIme: 4 hours 40 minutes

HOW LONG WILL IT LAST?!!

(My Note) Probably forever, now they have taken away the Bournemouth/Southampton exemption!

(My New Note) April 2015 Taka has got round  Bournemouth/Southampton airspace, on an ATOS, and done about 105 miles.

(My New, New Note) May 2016 Luke Nicol has landed at the same distance but he had to go north of the Bournemouth/Southampton airspace so his distance, round a turnpoint, was 112.5 miles. He had declared a goal at Okehampton but didn't make it.

(My New, New, New Note) April 2022 Mark Watts has done 94.2 miles on a P/G.

Richard B @ eventually Caburn 7 May 06

Conditions 7-12MPH SW
Sunny
Occasional weak thermals.

I woke up this morning with the usual pangs of guilt about having drunk too much, but felt confident it wouldn't be flyable and that made the me less concerned about my pitifall state as at least I wasn't going to miss out on any good flying....

After struggling out of my pit I checked the dyke webcam to discover that it looked pretty good, a few gliders in the air and more on launch, the wind 10 -13mph N - NNE. after a couple of minutes of procrastination I climbed into my car and headed south.

As I drove down towards the dyke I could see that no one was flying, so headed on to Firle where a couple of wings were out, but everyone was pinned to the hill. Not to be defeated I headed off towards bo peep assuming it could be better there. Sadly, I couldn't see anyone at all, so headed round to High and Over hoping that the sea breeze might have come in, it had, but it was too light and too southerly. I then thought that I would sack it and head back to London, but didn't want to miss out if things got better...

I then headed for newhaven on the basis that I'd never been and there was no sign of the sea breeze at caburn as I drove back past. I got down to newhaven to find that the sea breeze was established, but the wind was very westerly and too light. After 1/2 an hour or so I gave up and decided once more to head back to London (via Caburn) only to see a couple of gliders in the air.

I parked up chatted to Kevie and Ian G for a bit and then headed up the hill.

I flew terribly for about 30 - 40 minutes or so, constantly outsinking everyone else around and doing a number of slightly dodgy high speed slope landings. After realising that I was totally incapable of doing anything useful, I headed down, landed and packed up and prepared to go home. As I was leaving I could see about 20 gliders all happily floating around at launch height without too much trouble, doubtless I would not have been quite so lucky!.

Once I got home, I carried my glider back into the house and thought that it seemed a little heavy... Out of curiosity I jumped on the scales and realised that I have somehow managed to increase the weight of my kit by 10KGs, so rather than being near the top of the weight range I was a little over the top.

Overall a good day for flying but the combination of a slightly thick head, a lack of sleep and being overweight on my glider meant I did anything but make the most of it.

My First X/C, 19th June 1989

Bear in mind that no one had ever flown more than 12 miles from Bo Peep at this time and it was not considered to be an X/C site then(since this, of course, Steve Cook has done 90 miles from there.)

My First XC
by Little David Williamson (age 32 1/2)
Well... really my first XC was a one ­thermal dash over the back at Firle, with no vario, to the middle of nowhere - and that necessitated a 3-mile carry-back in very hot conditions. Although I couldn't bend my back the following morning,this did not put me off!
The day after that, Monday 19th June, my back having become mobile again, and armed with a vario/alti lent to me for the week by Kirran Patel (possibly the most magnanimous gesture madesince Jim O'Sullivan bought a round!),I was ready for another go. And so, gentle reader, I should like, if I may, to take you on a long(ish) journey.
The day was clear and sunny with a light to moderate NE wind and a reasonably high inversion layer just above the dew point - so off to Firle again. Having seen John Pendry in the pub on Saturday night and having had my suggestion that his site record of 12 miles to Brighton Beach could be broken within the next two days pooh-­poohed by Monique, these were just the conditions I'd hoped for.
Just after lunch, when the big weather­man in the sky decided that there were enough of us mere mortals scratching the ridge to make it sufficiently amusing to drop the monster sink of the day upon us, I went down into the trees in front of take off and landed where a
hang glider just ain't s'posed to go. Miraculously suffering no damage in what was, truthfully, a totalled glider situation, I thought about de-rigging there and then while close to the road and going home - but it was only 2:15pm, so yet another sweat-drenched carry­up while rigged and a help over the fence at the top. At least where there is sink there will also be lift.
On reaching the top I was told that Dave Keepax had skyed-out, heading towards Newhaven. I thought "well, I'm really pleased for him", but it came out of my mouth as "b#####d!"
I took off again and, searching for the thermals which had cunningly swerved to avoid me all day, I began to ponder whether, as this was my first day ever flying with them, the instruments had put a jinx on me. I turned them off to get rid of that annoyingly unmelodious bleeping.
At last, at 3 o'clock, I caught some­thing decent in front of the East bowl, turned the vario on again, and worked it back to 2,000 ft. The audio signal sure sounded like music now! Coming forward again, out of the lift, the wind was light enough for my Clubman to penetrate and still have 1,000 ft. out in front of the bowl. By now the inversion had
lifted sufficiently for the swirling mistiness just below it to grow into definite but immature looking clouds, which would not even reach puberty by the time they were culled by the cold sea air.
I centred the thermal below one of these and that was it - Mr. Top Landing had shut up the shop and gone on holiday.
"We're off!" Steady 3-up, which gradually crept to 6-up as I circled back 2 miles, and occasionally more when I searched hard for it. You couldn't do that without a vario!
The altimeter had clocked its way inexorably to 4,200 ft. by the time I was approaching Newhaven, in weaker lift, at the base of my prematurely decaying cloud. Off to the West the clouds looked healthier and so I left the lift and min.­sinked across the River Ouse, behind Newhaven and toward Peacehaven.
Arriving at Telscombe Cliffs I was wondering "What can you do with 2,000 ft?" Well... you can form a millepede tap dancing duo or you can carry on to a different landing field. The Windmill pitch'n'putt course was well within reach as I sank downwind in cold, moist air over the red-bricked cosiness of bungalows that is Saltdean, cossetted by their unstable ground level blanket of sun-warmed air. The cruel sea breeze threw an ice-cold haddock in under the blanket and the playful dwellings shrieked with surprise and mirth kicking the warmth skywards towards me.
I circled up in the ensuing dry, warm air with 5-up, by now sounding like Beethoven's 6th Symphony on the vario, and drifted out to sea up to 3,500 ft. where it seemed imprudent to get any further away from good old Blighty as I didn't have my wellies on! Pulling on a little speed crosswind in sink to get over the Marina, I had East Brighton Golf Club far below me to land on, but, as the tide was right out and the beach sparsely populated, a glide along the coast seemed in order. Suddenly "hello", what was this? A huge cloud of red dust enveloped the Wilson Avenue landfill site to the North of me. Had the Council employees had a post-curry bout of synchronised flatulence? Well, possibly so, as all that training is bound to payoff one of these days... but this was definitely a thermal, as the dust cloud was rising fast.
Pulling on speed with one hand, to leave my whip-hand free to give the keel an encouraging drubbing, I intersected the rising air and again circled in a 5-up, drifting over the green onion domes and blue plastic sheeting of the Brighton Pavilion, and out to sea up to 3,500 ft.
I was above all the muck in the air and the clear sky above was as deep a blue as the boat-dotted velvet sea below. Early evening commuters were getting part of their daily dose of lead poisoning, a helicopter passed by me in the opposite direction and 2,000 ft. below, and sailboards were idle on the beach and in use on Hove lagoon. I could see forever with a big, solitary cloud shadow over the sea just before Portslade and it all looked beautiful. I started to weep.
When I stopped crying I cut back to land in more sink and caught the last bit of lift which I circled with to 3,000 ft. Dismissing the idea of overflying Shoreham Power Station to look straight down the remaining chimney, I decided to work for as much height and distance out to sea as was possible, because Shoreham airspace was looming large - so I passed the Power Station on the East side. I then heard, and saw, a light aircraft heading NNW at an altitude not much lower than me, but it seemed to be making a landing approach on Shoreham Airport from very high. As the lift died and the sea breeze cut inland for good, I estimated, perhaps on the optimistic side, that I could clear Shoreham with 2,000 ft.(I wasn't going to go 2 miles out to sea and skirt around airspace as I would have been risking drowning, or worse, losing my beloved glider). The light plane landed at Shoreham and - uh-oh - all flying activity ceased. There was nothing in the air, nothing on the runway and nothing on the taxiway. I wondered what was happening. Had I shut down Shoreham Airport? That would be BIG trouble. No, I was sure I could overfly as long as I was above 2,000 ft. Looking towards the Isle of Wight, I could see an airship coming down the coast approaching Shoreham. They had shut down the airport to allow a mobile FujiFilm advert to cross the end of the runway at about 700 ft! Apart from having to treat the blimp as a roundabout, I had the sky to myself.
I overflew the airship, resisting the temptation to go down lower to wave to the crew, and continued my final glide until I crossed Worthing Pier. Circling down towards the large, sandy beach, I shouted to some dog-walkers to give me a wind direction but got no re­sponse other than a cursory glance upwards. So it was a flat-sided circle to confirm that the drift was, as expected, a SE sea breeze, and a landing flare onto tippy-toes into wind.
I landed at 4.55 pm. and, having secured witnesses and left the two best looking girls on the beach watching my glider and kit, I crossed the seafront road to 'phone a friend to come and retrieve me while I de-rigged and had a pint in an Hotel. Then it was back to Brighton just in time to get to work at 9:42 pm. (I work nights).
Since then nothing much has happened apart from a little sea breeze jaunt from the Dyke to Lewes but that, like the 11th floor that used to be on our 10 floor tower block, is another storey.
I should like to extend my heartfelt thanks to my instructor, Vince Hallam, everyone in the sport and the Southern Club who have given me such invaluable help and advice over the past 4 years, and Daphne, who doesn't always get a mention in Muckraker, but I've flown with her many times and, Daphne, you've made a happy man very old!
FINAL DISTANCE: 22 miles, GLIDER: Clubman 160, EQUIPMENT:
Borrowed Lindsay Ruddock Vario.

Richard Barber @ Monks Down & Combe 29 April

Having looked at the forecast for the alps early on Friday and compared them to the weatherjack forecast for the UK, there seemed little point in using my easyjet flights when it would only cost me £20 or so to change them...

Having decided the alps were out I then spent the rest of the afternoon surveying the weather forecasts at work....

I determined that the weather looked more promising further west and as there was a possibility that the wind would be a little North Easterly, I headed down to squat at mothers house conveniently placed near shaftsbury....

After I got up this morning I surveyed weatherjack and felt a little smug as Compton Abbas airfield was indicating 6 - 12 MPH winds NNE. as almost everywhere else was showing no wind at all!

After seeing the chart I left immediately (without changing the sheets, sorry mum!) and headed for Monks Down. I followed another pilot the last couple of miles to the site (another Richard) and we both got our gear out and started to get ready. Richard took off before me on his zoom and had a few scratchy beats back and forth, just about maintaining but definetely not going up. He then landed just as I'd finished faffing with my kit and sure enough a nice cycle came through right on queue. We took off again and he managed to climb to about 350M, but failed to really get through the inversion. I had been luckier and managed to keep with the lift to about 530M or 240M about launch, but the cycle petered out and as it was still early (before 11am), I didn't risk going over the back. I then pushed forward and quickly found myself back on the deck.

By this time a gaggle of other pilots arrived all of whom had initially gone to Bell (NW site), but had given up as it was too far to the North / North E.

When I next took off there were about 20 of us all stuck under the inversion, bouncing between T/O height and 350M... The lift areas were small and occasionally quite rough, but no one seemed to be having any trouble dealing with the conditions.

After an hour or so, I landed again and vented to Richard about the inversion and my complete incapacity to penetrate through it. I then hooked back in and waited. Eventually the cloud that was putting the hill in shadow passed and brought another cycle through.

I took off straight into lift. I then thermalled up, concentrating on staying with the lift and doing my damnest to ignore the fact that i was now heading over the back very low and not completely clear of the inversion. But, as far as I was concerned it was either going to be a fun XC or a landing in Madonna's estate, both options would give me something to talk about anyway!

Just as I was beginning to contemplate that I might not be going anywhere, I felt a reassuring tug as the climb which had almost come to a complete stop, start again with a slightly rough but reassuring 2UP which took me to 1000M or so where I decided to head off on glide only to find no more lift!

I landed at a farm about 2KMs past Tarrant Gunville and after a short spell of attempting to hitch got a taxi back to Monks, where it was looking pretty cloudy and not terribly inspiring, so I decided to head to Combe on my way back to London.

When I arrived there were about 30 wings in the air and about another 40 on the floor. It looked okay, so i got ready as fast as possible and was in the air within 3 - 4 minutes of arriving.

The conditions were pretty similar to those at Monks except the cycles were a bit stronger and it isn't the ideal site to fly in a NNE! However, I got up a bit and started thermalling with a tandem, but i fell out of the back of the thermal and got drilled to the ground, only to look up and see the tandem gaining height and distance away from the hill at great speed (bugger!).

I got myself organised in the middle of a very strong cycle so moved forward to the front of launch and decided to try and takeoff, which i did, but it wasn't so much a takeoff as a lift off!

After about 10seconds I looked down at my screaming vario to find the averager had already reached over 3M/S! Great perhaps I was going to go XC again after all!

I then started to thermal up a bit with a couple of others who seemed a little more determined to stay above the ridge than me. I ignored them (knowing little of the site and headed over the back in the lift I was in). The other pilots then headed over the back and I figured we would probably meet up at base...

However, this was a nice reminder as to the Niave idiot that I am as at that moment I lost the lift and had to decide whether I wanted to run downwind and hope for some unlikely lift or risk heading back to the hill, but risk arriving behind the spinback.

Having already had one lousy XC I decided to head back and my trusty Tempest battled well against the headwind and got me back to above takeoff just above launch.... only to see the other gaggle just behind me also having given up on their xc adventure!

I then decided to sack it as the conditions were still quite strong / rough and it didn't appear I was going to get any decent distance, SILLY ME! As soon as I'd packed up I watched the other guys i'd been thermalling with hook into another thermal that this time kept going to base..

After landing I had a chat with a few pilots who hadn't flown since the morning and we discussed the problems of the dyke (busy and incident rich). Just as we finished our discussion an almighty gust came though and we then saw/ heard one pilot have a BIG frontal and then watched the other pilots in his area have collapse after collapse whilst being tossed around the sky!

One of the pilots was then over enthusiastic trying to pump out a small collapse and spun his glider. After about 700* of turn or so, he did the right thing and threw his reserve and had a safe landing.

I ran over to stop him getting dragged with a few others and was very happy to see he was okay and I am pretty sure he will be investing in an SIV course soon!

All in all an eventful and excellent days flying, but once again the dangers were there for all to see.

Richard

Simon Phipps 28 April

I checked out the shipping forecast this morning and showed a ‘perfect’ North force 3-4. Having seen the number of people on the webcam waiting at the Dyke I decided to head for Ditchling and arrived at about 1pm. I was shocked and appalled to see the pay-for-parking at £2 a go so I parked on the verge then checked out the wind. It was a bit top-end but seemed OK. I took off easily enough and did a couple of beats of the ridge East of the car park. Although it was strong I only got about 150ft above take off. I gave it 10 minutes but was having a bit of trouble penetrating even with speed bar so I decided to come in and try the Dyke instead. It got turbulent coming in so I waited for a ‘down’ bounce and did an A-line collapse which worked fine.
At the Dyke it was again top-end and Northerly although a few had flown. After a bit of parawaiting I decided it has calmed down a bit and took off, heading straight for the North ridge. I guessed that if it was flyable then within a few minutes I’d have about twenty others joining me. When I got to the bowl I could not penetrate even with speed bar. I had enough height to get to the winch field so did a U-turn and landed without incident. I don’t think any other paragliders flew for the rest of the day.

Simon Phipps

Annecy Good Friday

Having arrived in Annecy on the ready from gatwick courtesy of easyjet and Joan from Maison du Moulin, I hooked up with a few of of the guys who'd driven down from the UK overnight (and I call easyjet the redeye?!).

We then planned to head to Plan Fait after erecting tents (not my tents and not my idea, but since I was hitching a lift I had to keep quiet).

Eventually we got down to plan fait to find about 60 pilots in the air and another 20 or so milling around launch. We all got ready quickly and got off without a hitch.

I then had the most exciting and exhausting 45 minutes of flight in my career so far. Plan Fait is on the top edge of a cliff with shelf that then goes back to a small (by alpine standards) peak behind (the teeth. Anyway after taking off and getting a bit of height above the ridge I tried to thermal in all three of the places where they kicking off, the left edge, the centre and the right hand end, but found myself playing a crazy version of chicken / roulette with 60+ pilots, some of whom were determined to ridge run and ignore thermals others who would fly straight at pilots thermalling forcing radical evasive maneuvers. After 40 minutes or so I saw that Dave Massie had landed and I decided that since I was incapable of getting through the inversion in the melee I would go down and join him... We then recounted numerous scare stories to each other and agreed we were better off on the ground, but would have been far better off at Forclaz with Irwyn and the rest of the Active Air course who were having a great time in totally uncrowded skies.

Conditions
Thermals strong small and broken 5up on averager and I never got a core :(
Airlaw - Ownership is the law?!
Acro - 1 spiral dive from thermal to avoid human dart...
Cloudbase 1800M
Adrenaline - off the scale
Enjoyment high after landing (joy to be alive)
Richard Barber

Southern Club Flying Diaires: 2006-04-16

Southern Club Flying Diaires: 2006-04-16

1994 flight from the dyke to Deal!

Sunday 5th June 1994 looked like it was going to be on at the Dyke and I was contemplating having an early night on Saturday, when I got a 'phone call from Dave Matthews. He told me that I had got the dates mixed up and that there was a Club Night at the Dyke pub. He also said that, according to his theory, Sunday would be a good X/C day due to it being early in the summer and post cold frontal with an approaching warm front. So it was up to the pub to attend an excellently entertaining talk on instrumentation, by Ron Richardson. It was also nice to be able to take the fairly rare oppertunity to have a chat with Ron and Val(and blackmail them with the photographic evidence of the goings on at Ron's 40th birthday party)! If I'd known then how much of Ron I was going to see on the following day I would probably not have been quite so bothered. We got home late and got the gliders loaded up ready for the morning, On Sunday morning I overslept until 9.30 a.m. -- oh dear -- but still went through the routine of grating a teaspoon of fresh ginger into my cup of coffee(it numbs the nerves in your stomach and prevents airsickness in rough thermals,without causing drowsiness). I was rigging my Santana at the Dyke in a moderate westerly wind and watching a few gliders, including Tony Lucessi, already soaring Newtimber. By the time I was clipped in they'd already thermalled away into a good looking sky. I had three flights, attempting to get to Newtimber in difficult to work thermals, which all ended in tight top landings back at the Dyke(one of them involved having to avoid Sky Systems training ground-handling on top of the east bowl)Steve Cook, on a borrowed Moyes which I think had a handling problem due to mis-rigging, bottom landed, as did Johnny Carr on the Swift (perhaps it would be more associated with thermals if it were sponsored by Damart). Two paragliders managed to get airborne in a rare lull but landed very soon afterwards. Presumably it was too strong; it was certainly rough!My next attempt found me in a weak thermal that carried me over to Newtimber, where I joined five others and we soared for over 45 mins. Lots of thermals were coming through, but all of them were too weak to gain any real amount of height in. As usual, people soaring the Dyke looked like they were frequently doing better than us. Eventually a good cycle came through at Newtimber and all six of us went over the back in it. Ron Richardson and Dave Matthews were initially the highest but Trevor Ackroyd and myself were in the best core, slightly upwind in 8-up lift. The situation resolved to the point where there were three of us in the weakening thermal core: Ron on top; me in the middle; Trevor below. We could see the others landing out as we drifted with the lift along the line of the Ditchltng ridge. I had to let Trevor through as he was climbing faster than me, turning very flat, as you can on a Rumour. Trevor moved about 200 yds. away from me and got a slightly better climb, so I flew towards him, also finding a better climb, until we converged to be back together again. Ron was watching from above, picking off the best bits as we marked them. We topped out at about 2,500 ft. a.s.l. and, not being able to find anything else around, stuck with the thermal, gradually losing about 900 ft. As we drifted over Cliffe Hill, past Lewes at 1,600 ft. a.s.l., Trevor went back into wind and got some better lift. He gained height and turned north. Sadly, although there were plenty around, the inland thermals were too weak to maintain in and he went down. With Ron still above me I continued to drift over the new opera house at Glyndebourne, all the while losing height in weak lift, until I was so low, at 1000 ft. above the ground, that I had to head downwind towards Chalvington, north of the Arlington reservoir. Ron saw me rewarded by a 2-up climb and came over to join me, still above. I seem to remember seeing a de-rigged glider on the ground near here which could have been Tony Lucessi. As I passed the reservoir the lift diminished again so I headed towards Hellingly hospital to get a bit more inland. Ron waited up high until I contacted lift, then came over to join me. I could see a few scattered wisps of sea-breeze convergence and one clump of the same that was more solid looking, so I headed north to dive under it to the inland side. Ron wisely stayed in the lift to see what happened to me. I went down and down until I was making a landing approach from 300 ft. at -- the seemingly appropriatly named -- Brownbread Street.It was 2.00 p.m. so the pub would still be open: I'd done 25 miles without making a mistake so maybe things could have been worse. All the same, it was not nice to look up and see Ron still at 2,000 ft. Just as I was choosing whether to land in the field with horses in it or the field with power lines in it, BANG!; I hit the sea-breeze front at 200 ft. a.g.l. There was plenty of strong but totally incoherent lift. I had a real good scrap with the sea-breeze front: a 360 here; change direction and a 360 there; S-turning and trying to stay in the lifting bits of the churning air -- in 3 miles of drifting I gained 70 ft.! I was then blessed with two bits of good fortune:­ Firstly I saw a group of white birds leave the ground on the north side of Battle and immediately headed for them but:"Oh woe is me!", they flew south, flapping all the way, in the cold side of the front. Half-way to where I'd seen them take off from I stumbled into a more solid patch of lift and started S-turning, to feel my way round it. I then noticed a glider which I had not seen ealiier, coming at me on a long glide from a WNW direction, losing height all the way. It turned out to be Warren Simonsen. He arrived at the same height as me,100 yds. to the west, failed to contact the lift and went down at Battle. The second bit of luck was a bonfire, which had just been lit, indicating by its smoke trail that it was in a north-westerly airflow and therefore just on the warm side of the front. I circled the consolidating 4-up lift, staying exactly downwind of the bonfire and rising with the smoke. Everything became more comfortable and less sweat-drenched!
I climbed to 2000 ft. and then headed inland a bit, using the bonfire as a marker to give a good mental picture of the front, going just south of the Powdermill reservoir. Upon climbing to 3,000 ft. I met up with Ron again and shouted an appropriate greeting, as he'd been convinced that I'd gone down. We thermalled together for about 5 miles and the sea-breeze convergence cloud was starting to form a solid line behind and above us towards the coast and out beyond Rye to the east. Many, many miles to the west there was some high cloud visible from the approaching warm front. As we passed Rye I headed inland following the line of the Royal Military Canal(disused) around the inland edge of Walland Marsh, thus having a good chance of staying on the warm side of the front. Ron carried on drifting due east and was about 1,000 ft. above me when I saw him rocketing along in a straight line downwind without losing any height; he was obviously in the sea-breeze front, lower than the visible convergence. Wishing that I was up there with him, I set off on a straight glide to follow his lead, only stopping to circle after hitting a good bit of 5-up lift. I saw Ron, by now about 3 miles east of me, stop and circle his way up the warm side of the convergence cloud until he was out of sight round the bend in the front. A dozen Hercules transport aircraft flew by in procession, following the coastline, about 3,000 ft. below. They were returning from Normandy after having dispatched their loads of paratroopers to mark the D-Day commemeration. I climbed up the warm side of the convergence cloud 5 miles due south of Ashford and followed the line of it round the Military Canal and Romney Marsh, thankful to have the sea-breeze lift to get across the 'Ashford Blue Hole.' As I rounded the corner of cloud:"Oh joy of joys!,"the convergence line was clearly defined for the next 20 miles to beyond Dover: I was thinking:"It's on for Deal from here," but told myself to stay calm and not make any more mistakes. I was amazed not to be able to see Ron where I expected him to be: having a whale of a time flying the front. As I zoomed flat out along the front,at 4,000 ft., I looked down through a hole in the cloud and saw Ron 2,000 ft. below me, sinking in the cold side. It seems that the convergence cloud to the east had not formed when Ron got to Hythe, just 10 mins. before I did, and so, with no visible signs of the front, he had pressed on and got caught on the cold side. He landed near Folkestone. I then had another 15 miles of classic full speed sea-breeze front flying, never below 3,000 ft. and up to 5,000 ft., running parallel to the coast south of the Channel Tunnel entrance at Folkestone and then just north of Dover harbour. The Channel Tunnel is an impressive construction,but will anyone be happy about the security of such a venture --particularly in view of the discovery of a terrorist plot to disable it by booking a cargo load of tampons on Le Shuttle, with the intention of activating the fire sprinkler system exactly half-way across?-- Anyhow, from 5,000 ft. at Dover harbour I could see the mainland of France below me on the other side; it looked tempting but, with a cross-wind, I wouldn't realistically have expected to make it more than half-way. There was a short gap in the convergence line over Dover town but I only lost 400 ft. crossing it and then climbed back up to 5000 ft. at South Foreland.
I turned north, away from the convergence, on a heading towards Deal, thinking that perhaps I'd make it to North Foreland. As I headed north I got no lift at all(the inland thermals were still too weak) and so, thinking that Deal would have to do, I dropped my legs out of prone at 3,000 ft. and pedalled the air for a while to get the blood flowing again(they'd been hooked up in prone for 4 hours and I wanted to have a functioning undercarriage): At 1,500 ft. over Deal I flew out to sea to take a photo, just to show that I'd got beyond the coast, finally landing 3 yds. from the low tide mark in front of Deal Castle(Ref. TR 379 523). It was about 3,45 p.m.I kissed the ground and put the pebble d'amour into my harness pocket. --Well, I had been trying to make this flight since my first attempt in 1989 ended after only 25 miles!-- I couldn't carry my glider up the steep beach as the shingle was sliding down under my feet, so the children who had run up to me when I landed got behind and pushed the keel for me. The sea-breeze came in on the Deal coast at 5.00 p.m. and didn't look like it was that usable --but who knows; maybe by waiting over South Foreland for 75 mins. the record could have been broken? Having de-rigged, I found a pub which was serving all afternoon, despite it being Sunday, and arranged for a retrieve. It may be coincidence but the only two gliders to make Deal in the last six years or more had been Santanas. Sadly, they're no longer manufactured anyhow: I'm sure that I can think of better ways of spending a Sunday afternoon;it's just that I've never managed to think of any thus far!

DAVE WILLIAMSON.

Distance: 74.25 miles.

Glider: Santana SRC.

Vario: Davron 200.

Time: 3 hrs. from leaving Newtimber.

Harness: CJ Stirrup.

Shit stepped in prior to take off: Dog.

Fags consummed during flight: O. Fags consummed after flight: 20.

David Williamson on his old record flight from the dyke

Top picture shows Canterbury from 4500', looking north, with the cathedral, top left, picked out by sunshine.



It was a warm and wet night in the city.The noise of cars swishing past lay far below, outside the blacked-out window of a smoke-filled room. In a single pool of light in the middle of the room a group of burly figures in sharp suits were gathered round a table. The silence was broken by the fluttering sound of a large moth's wings against the green glass lampshade. Swiftly, one of the men pulled a .44 Magnum from under his jacket and blasted the insect into the surrounding darkness. "Aw," a sad looking man exclaimed. "What'da ya do dat for, boss?""He was enjoying his flying too much," the marksman barked back. " Now listen up. Thoseguys down at the BHPA are trying to muscle in on our territory on the lower east side and I say that we let 'em take it.""But boss, da CAA have controlled dat area for years," the sad man interjected. "Look what happened when we let da Nigerians into Wales an' da aluminium started to hit the streets.""Yeah. Sure, it was like a battlefield to start with but they've pulled out now an' it's all quiet again. Anyways, the Cross-Channel route is just a dark alley that no one wants to go down... only to find Belgium at the other end. Take a look at the balance sheet - It's showing less returns than a kamikaze alrbase.""OK boss, me an' da boys is right behind you. We'll pull out of Kent for good."

And so, early In 1993, Manston Cross-Channel SRZ was removed, making it legal to fly north of Deal and beat Michel Carnet's six-year-old record, flying east from Devil's Dyke. The furthest point you can get to is North Foreland, the other side of RAF Manston. Fellow Southern Club flier Rod Lees said he'd been up there and that the coastline was pretty inhospitable, so I consulted the OS map and saw that there is a golf course which affords plenty of landing possibilities.
When you've used all your allocation of sick days up for the year to go flying, you have a problem with cross-countries: you dare not fly too far away in case you can't get back home in time for the night shift. Sunday August 28th, 1994 was a Bank Holiday weekend and I didn't have to go into work that night. I hadn't seen weather forecast and arrived at the Dyke at 9am to see cumulus already beginning to form. There had been cumulus out over the sea all night and they were still there. The forecast must have said that it was going to be blown out as there was no-one else there apart from Trevor Ackroyd, another Southern pilot, who arrived at 10am, by which time I was rigged. It was blowing a moderate to fresh westerly and looking good. Cloud base was a bit low, but it was still early. I hadn't seen a single bird thermalling (could it have been that the drift was too strong to make it attractive to them?). I thought that it would overdevelop but Trevor, who hadn't seen a forecast either, said that it wouldn't. In fact there was a low over the Hebrides that was quickly pulling cold, dry air down from Alaska and over Ireland and the south of England from a westerly direction.I took off on my Santana SRC at 11.00am into weak lift and flew straight over to Newtimber. At 11.15 I took a rough thermal up to 2,200' but it stopped there and I pulled back into wind toNewtimber. It was getting very rough in the ther­mals; at one point I was rolled about 90 degrees before I even had time to put a correction in. Trevor took off and came over to join me. We more or less stayed at opposite ends of the ridge. He said later that the first thermal he flew through made him go weightless six times! We got loads of thermals, but nothing that we managed to climb in until 11.58 when we went over the back, topping out at 2,400ft. This was no better than the one that I'd had 45 minutes earlier, but what the heck!I was drifting back quickly in a 0-2 up when Trevor came towards me from the south and slotted in fifty feet below. I was just maintaining height but Trevor was gradually getting lower and headed off downwind towards Lewes. He got no lift all the way and landed at Offham. I stuck with my zero until it became sink and then headed due south, at 90' to the direction Trevor had gone,towards a sharply defined sea-breeze front on the coast. I found another 0-2 up thermal long before I got to the sea breeze and stayed with that, drifting over Lewes. I noted that it had taken less than 25 minutes to get to Lewes and, as the lift was better, I started working my way northwards and passed just north of Ringmer. There was a sailplane a long way to the south which looked like it was steaming along the sea breeze.Having drifted over Heathfield town I started working my way north again, but as I passed the lakes at Ticehurst. I thought: "This is silly. I'm keeping myself under the 3,500' limit (london TMA) and cloudbase is now way up high." So I drifted with a good thermal, flying a wide circle round the edge of it to keep down to 3,500'. This was hard work; being on the edge made the thermal tip me away from it all the time, so I went for the easier technique for keeping low: fly away from the core in an upwind direction (the upwind edge always seems to have the sharpest definition between lift and sink). As you enter sink, start counting whilst maintaining your heading. After eight seconds turn 180 degrees and head down­wind, counting ten seconds. If you are not in the lift again, search both ways along a line at 90 degrees to the downwind direction and you should find it.Climb until back at the airspace limit and repeat. It's a lot less strenuous on the arms!Once over the boundary I climbed up to 5,500' over Tenterden and was on the north edge of a 1 1/2-mile-wide cloud street which had the sea breeze on its south side. From just north of Woodchurch I could see (visibility in the air was 40 miles) that the street was absolutely solid all the way to Dover! It was tempting to follow this as there would have been little chance of going down, but it would have meant turning north. after Dover and having no option to work weak thermals as I would have been getting blown out to sea. I decided to try to pass Ashford on the west side to give me a chance of breaking the Dyke record. I left this decision too late; leaving the lift and heading north to the next cloud gave me a north-easterly drift, which meant that I got under the cloud directly over Ashford - just what I was trying to avoid!The cloud dissolved quickly and I was in 8 - 10 down sink, as is usual over Ashford. I made a downwind dive towards the M20 but there was no visible sign of habitation on the other side, or of bridges back across the motorway. I changed to a north-westerly heading, partly into wind,which gave me a glide which would cross the motorway for a landing at Kennington where I could see a cricket match taking place. I was down to less than 600ft agl and just approaching the motorway when the right wing kicked up. I got chucked around going in and out of strong lift, but gained height! Drifting over a sewage farm also gave me a good incentive not lose the thermal.",
I centred the thermal and climbed up to 5,500ft, heading north to get round Canterbury. There were two clouds in between the cloud streets and I only lost 2,000ft getting across. The city was in shadow apart from one ray of sun­light shining directly on the cathedral, making it stand out beautifully. Looking south I could see Calais about 33 miles away. I was by now well north of Deal with North Foreland clearly in sight ten miles away. Clouds were everywhere, with a base at over 6,000ft. I headed north, drifting over the edge of Manston ATZ but never getting lower than 4,000ft. I crossed three miles of sea to arrive just east of Ramsgate at 3,000ft and hopped from thermal to thermal past Broadstairs. I could see the golf course on the coast at North Foreland! I thought: "Hang on a minute, it's only taken three hours to fly 80 miles! The wind drift could be quite strong... I may have less penetration than Dave Matthews after a night on the Newcastle Brown!" So before getting to the coast I turned into wind and checked my drift. It was all right - I wasn't going backwards - so I carried on and turned into wind over the golf course at 3,000ft.A thermal came through and took me back up to 3,500ft while I was S-turning over the landing field. A black and yellow Cessna made three fairly close passes to have a look at me, and I descended to land by the 14th tee at 3.00pm in a 20-23mph wind. 79.74 miles! Fortunately the Captain Digby, across the road from the 7th tee, stays open until 5.00pm on Sundays...It had been a very interesting flight, covering the ground very quickly and involving 40 miles of crosswind flying, but I think that I've been going on about it a bit too much: the other day a bloke in the pub threatened to nut me and throw me out of the window if I didn't stop talking about it. I wouldn't have minded, but he only went in there to sell the War Cry!