14 Jun 07

14 Jun 07


Southerly Wave

Barbara prepares for a short hop

Climbing at Mont Aujour	After the 10am weather briefing at Sisteron, we drove to Gap to prepare 220, which had been left there overnight following yesterday's excitement. The weather was dry but overcast and there was a strong possibility that we would just be making a short hop between airfields. Barbara Glossop was volunteered to fly in the back seat. After launching, we found that the tete de Boursier and Malaup were working well and with added cumulus we climbed high enough to cross to the crete de Selles.

Eventually we connected with some gentle wave coming off St Genis. The wind as we climbed to 9000ft veered from 150º/15 knots to 210º/25 knots. We found more wave at Malaup and again over Hongrie, where we had to pull out of a climb at FL115 due to airspace. As the afternoon progressed the wave got more reliable until, at the end of the flight, we were either blatting along the Jabron at 95 knots with the airbrakes cracked to keep under their FL75, or taking 7 knots to the neighbouring airspace at FL115. An unexpected fun day...

Phil Duffin and passenger in a Duo Discus X-alike