Yes indeed, Wolcott gave it up for a beautiful flight on the 8th. I was being a skeptic about the winds. I was hearing so many conflicting reports in regards to winds strength, that I almost blew the day off. Winds at the Copper AWOS were gusting to the mid to upper 30's, and at Eagle there were gusts to 27 mph. Since this seemed like the best possible day out of the week, several pilots decided to rendezvous at the hang glider LZ to check it out. After watching for 15 minutes, even with the AWOS reports, we decided this may be the last chance in a while, so we went up to launch.
We got to launch about 3:15 pm. Checking the winds, we recorded a gust to 27 mph, but the average most of the time was about 15 mph. Bobby Blount geared up and decided to launch as we felt there may be a surface compression, and the winds were mostly steady at 12 with gusts to 18 mph. Calling the Eagle tower winds were not on the increase, so conditions were after all looking quite favorable.
Once Bobby launched his penetration was excellent. As we were gearing up, Tom Vail arrived as the only hang glider pilot. Perfect conditions for baggies and hangies.
Once off I could not believe the conditions. I was getting 10 mph ground speed into the wind. Conditions at launch were definitely stronger then in the air, and the air was as smooth as a glass off. It was easy to climb out right from launch, and finally hooking a decent thermal I climbed out to about 11,000 msl. There seemed to be an inversion at this point as the lift stopped at this elevation. However, it was easy to stay between 10,000 and 11,000 msl as the air seemed really bouyant.
We could actually chat with the boys BJ, and SF at Williams and they were saying it was rowdy over Williams Peak, but nice over the valley.
We were lucky, it seemed that this was the only day we were going to get for the rest of the week. Maybe next week will work out to be decent after this winter like storm goes through. Stay tuned.
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