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Aviation History
1959
1959 - 3424.PDF
FLIGHT, 18 December 1959 757 Piggott and primary arrive in France—welcome by Gillian Horsfield Lasham, followed by M. Heron, C.F.I, of the Gliding Centre,and Madame Be Abelanda, an enthusiastic glider pilot and inter- preter. Most of the French club members seemed never to haveseen a primary before and were highly amused. But with great generosity they had kept back their only truck and trailer for us inspite of their own glider pilots waiting almost 200 miles away at Nancy after a cross-country flight. With everyone helping we soon had the glider dismantled andfitted on to the open trailer and off we went to the centre of Paris, tired but happy. It had been a battle of endurance, not of speed,and we didn't really care when we were told that someone had done the same trip in 47 min against our 11 hr 20 min. Arriving back at Lasham after my flight to Paris in the primaryI was confronted with the news that a Lasham glider had soared to Calais, proof that a soaring flight to Paris had been a pos-sibility on that day. Critics were soon suggesting that I should have soared to Paris in a modern glider instead of being towedin the primary. I was the first to agree, but how could I have known that the weather would be suitable on even one of theten days of the race? My stiffness had scarcely worn off before good soaring condi-tions returned, with a not-unfavourable wind over France. Day after day went by with my frustration increasing. The weatherwas obviously possible but the expense and difficulty of a field landing in France if I failed to reach Paris made me put off myattempt. Finally I made up my mind to blow the expense and to make a try on one of the remaining days of the competition. To my surprise the race stewards raised no objection to mychanging the type of glider from the EoN primary to the EoN Olympia 419, the elite of British high-performance machines.This time the Messenger was to be piloted by Brian Masters, assistant C.F.I, at Lasham, and I planned to release just north ofDeal with sufficient height to glide across the Channel and reach soaring conditions over France. A stable layer of air at about6,000ft made it quite out of the question to soar across the Channel, and in any case it was doubtful whether soaring the230 miles from Blackbushe to Paris was possible on any day without a strong following wind. Once more the main consideration was to complete the course,and we took our time checking the weather carefully before take- off. Luck was with us and the forecast showed that soarable condi-tions should exist over France and that the flight was a possibility. At 11.22 a.m., three hours after leaving Marble Arch, we tookoff for the release point at Deal. As we passed over the deserted gliding site of Detling and clear of the airways and control zonewe started to climb, and at 12.55 I released at 8,800ft and turned out to sea towards Calais. This time I had the comfort and pro-tection of a cabin and a gliding angle of over 35:1 instead of a thin nylon tow rope. The air was absolutely stable and silky smooth and, glidingquietly along at 43 kt, I waited patiently for the first signs of the French coast. Thirty-two minutes later I crossed the coast justnorth of Cap Gris Nez at 4,300ft. Ahead I could see several haze layers and small cumulus clouds, and below me smallragged cumulus looking more like lifted sea fog than anything else. The cloud shadows indicated a surprisingly strong north-easterly wind, probably 20-30 kt, and I realized that I would have difficulty in getting inland to die better conditions. Soaringwould be very marginal with such a wind and low cloudbase. A glance at the map showed that there was no airfield within reachand that I just had to stay up. I floated down through the broken cloud, finding weak lifthere and there. After losing several hundred feet in attempting to circle in a small patch of apparently strong lift, I resolved toforce inland as far as I could and not to risk circling unless I was sure I would gain height. The next 20 minutes were about the most exciting ever. Thethought of a field landing without even a dictionary was enough to keep me going and eventually, after a few minutes of strugglingbelow 1,000ft, the first sensible French thermal arrived. By Sketches by Fenlyth Wilt 2.20 p.m. I was 2,500ft near Desvres with the cloudbase movinghigher and the weather looking better every minute. As I passed by a few miles to the east of Le Touquet, I knewthat the Messenger was waiting diere and hoping for no news of me. I was rather worried about the sea breeze effect along thecoast, because I kept getting blown out towards the sea and find- ing myself under the last line of cumulus. Then as I approachedAbbeville the sky suddenly cleared of cloud to the south in spite of the obviously wet ground below. This meant one of two things;either the air ahead was stable and unsoarable, or else the air had dried out so that no cloud was forming. I hung around gaining asmuch height as possible before striking out into the clear air in hope of another thermal. To my surprise, I found that conditionswere far better and that invisible, dry thermals now went much higher. I quickly increased my cruising speed to 65 kt and flew fromtown to town using only strong thermals and trying to get back on track. The main difficulty was map-reading as the visibility wasdown to a few miles in places. At about 5.30 the haze began to cut off the heat of the sun, andthe thermals became weaker and farther apart. The wind had become much lighter, probably a following wind of 5 kt, and Itook out my gliding-angle scale and calculated that over 7,000ft of height would be needed to reach my goal at Beynes. I had tofind several more diermals or fail, so I worked each thermal carefully and diverted to fly over every likely source. If necessary I would land at Les Mureaux, and soon it wastheoretically within range. A few miles north of Mantes-Gassicourt aerodrome the last real thermal took me to 5,300ft and I set offtowards Beynes. On my flight plan from Blackbushe I had declared Toussus-le-Noble as my destination because Beynes was a gliding site and had no Customs office. The rules of die race demanded the sameroute as declared and flown in the primary and I argued the pros and cons of annoying the Customs officials or of possible disquali-fication by die race stewards. I was still undecided when I arrived near Beynes. A few milesaway diere was a large area of crops on fire and I joined another glider in die smoke and tried to gain some more height. Afterabout ten minutes I realized that I was not winning and that I must head for Beynes immediately. I arrived widi just enoughheight to turn in comfortably and land by die hangar at 6.40 p.m. After a visit to the local gendarme to get my papers stampedwe drove to die Arc de Triomphe at hair-raising speed to arrive just before the French speed aces. Our whole flight had probablybeen made on the amount of fuel mat they had used to get their jets off the ground, and we were amused but not ashamed tocompare our time of 12 hours with theirs of 45 minutes. From release to landing I had flown over 155 miles in 5 hr45 min—by no means a record, but a demonstration of the capabilities of a modern glider as a means of transport. FAST AND HOT By Cdr. IAN MARTIN. UN. (Chnf Tactical Instructor, Naval Air Fighter School, R.NJLS. Lossiemouth) ILE doing 70 m.p.h. on the pillion ofa motor cycle in Paris traffic through successive crossroads of equal priority widi-out slackening speed, it is probably best to close one's eyes and meditate on how one arrived in suchan unfortunate predicament. This is not easy, but can come widi practice.We had realized at the outset that there would inevitably be time lost in the aircraft, as the pilot had to strap himself in beforetaking off. This loss was counteracted by die decided speed and acceleration advantage which die Scimitar had over other aircraftin die race. Furthermore die distance suited the Scimitar—it was the only fighter which could race wimout drop-tanks andstill have a reasonable fuel reserve. We decided that it was best to race only from Paris to London,to avoid language problems on the R/T and to have available proven homing aids in die event of poor visibility. Wisley wasselected as the best airfield for several reasons. Firstly, being
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