What's New

For 12 years now the soaring flight evaluation program Onlinecontest or OLC has become the worldwide standard for evaluation of flight performance providing almost instant insight into what is happening in the world of XC soaring. It went thru a number of changes and updates but is now officially endorsed by the International Gliding Committee (IGC) and has been a tremendous instigator of getting pilots to push their XC soaring skills.

The annual AERO Exhibition for General Aviation in Friedrichshafen took place in the middle of April 2015 and this year (as every second year now) it included the full glider segment.  Almost all major manufacturers for sailplanes, accessories and engines showed up and presented their latest offerings.  There were few new sailplane designs but a lot of refinements and developments.  Most notable was the eagerness of most manufacturers to offer some sort of electrical propulsion either as sustainer or self-launching application.  At the same time, jet engines are also off

By Ron Clark

Friday March 27^th was a good wave day for our part of the country.  On the way to the airport I got a good look at the amazing lenticular cloud hovering over Mt. Pilchuck that Dan Housler had told me about earlier on the phone.

Now that the year 2014 has is history, it is time again to look at the state of the Evergreen Soaring club.  We have still fewer tows than several years ago and our XC flying has decreased considerably.  We had to cope with particularly rainy weather in spring, the Oso landslide TFR and the unavailability of towing or instruction at times.   Let’s call 2014 a year of consolidation and work on increasing our activities again.

Now that the official OLC year 2014 is over it is time again to review again all the XC soaring flying in Western Washington this year. After a slow beginning due to very wet weather the soaring season started in earnest.

One of the reservations that some pilots have about going XC from Arlington concerns the difficulty of connecting with lift and getting sufficient altitude to get going.  This is especially true in late summer when the flat lands around Arlington and even the foothills further east offer only marginal lift and altitudes that make even staying up a chore.  These conditions look even less inviting when there are no clouds to indicate any convection (which happens quite often).  What is not apparent in these cases (even with Dr. Jack’s predictions) is the fact that the higher mountains, starting some 15 to 20 miles further east  from Arlington, quite often offer great thermal conditions.

After a soarable spring and early summer, mellow and, unfortunately, stable weather takes over the Puget Sound. In attempt to break away from it, four pilots - Ron Clark, Brad Hill, Bill Ling and Movses Babayan, moved to Twisp for a few days for a chance to experience some of the stellar soaring conditions that Methow Valley has to offer. Phil Anderson has graciously provided towing in 17Z.

The annual Arlington Fly-In in July with its busy traffic, air show restrictions and tower operations has become the stimulus for an Evergreen excursion to one of the nearby mountain airfields (Darrington or Concrete).  This year the destination was Concrete over the July 12/ 13 weekend.  Concrete had not been visited for a few years by Evergreen and – most of all - it has now a fuel pump, eliminating having to transport fuel.

A lot has been said and speculated about the best preparations for XC soaring preparedness - two-seat XC, buddy flying with more experienced pilots, simulator training, planned landings in grass airfields and so on. One key ingredient is of course being prepared to make off-field landings "when the wind dies" and there is no convenient airfield in reach.

On March 21 a historic land slide devastated a little community east of Oso, about 15 miles from Arlington airport. And since March 23 a "temporary" flight restriction zone (TFR) with a radius of 8 nm and up to 6000 ft has been in effect.

The annual SSA convention in Reno (Feb. 27 to Mar. 2) was well attended, including by a large contingent of Northwest pilots. It was a time to find out what is new and get motivated for the coming season. As usual there were a lot of interesting talks and interesting contacts, even if there was not too much technical news.

So here are some personal impressions:

Since the advent of modern composite sailplanes with ever increasing sophistication and performance pilots with yesteryear’s types have tried to equalize the achieved performances in competition or record flying with the help of handicapping systems.  And ever since such handicapping systems were devised pilots have argued about the fairness of such systems.  The goal is of course to emphasize pilot

Since 2005 Evergreen Soaring recognizes (and encourages) upcoming club XC pilots by listing the first reasonably documented soaring flight that includes a straight line distance of at least 50 km in Western Washington. This is in recognition of the memory of Joe Patton who very much encouraged such flying and who left us much too early.

The 2013 OLC year ended officially on Monday October 14, 2013 and with that the WBC 2013 has also been decided. So here are the results - a list of the best flights for each pilot from Western Washington. Most of the flights started at Arlington (Evergreen's home base) but two flights originated in Bergseth (home of PSSA).

With the sale of Evergreen’s last L-13 Blanik – N 2414J – the era of the Blanik seems to have come to an end, for Evergreen and probably the US.  While 14J is supposed to continue its career as an exhibition model in Auburn (hopefully providing some advertising for soaring and Evergreen) no L-13 has flown in the US since 2010, when a mid-air breakup in Austria grounded the L-13 worldwide. 

Halfway thru the soaring season it is time again to look at our yard stick for west side XC soaring - the Willy Burhen Cup (WBC 2013).  This little friendly competition amongst west side soaring pilots is now in its 10^th year and still gaining momentum.  It is based on the best west side soaring flight of any pilot according to the OLC rules and has proved to be quite a stimulus for exploring the challenging XC potential of Western Washington. So here are the results for the WBC 2013 as of July 15. 

There were all the ingredients of a big day – a good weather prediction from Dan Housler, an eager group of ES pilots finally hoping for a great XC day, an impressive early line-up and start of towing just after 11 am.  Phil Andersen did the towing honors and one by one all hopeful pilots disappeared apart from one that sunk out (guess who).  Clouds were still trying to develop over the low lands while the mountains were full of low clouds but conditions gradually improved.  Most pilots were able to fly later in the mountains getting to over 7000 ft.  It turned into a lo

The increasing popularity of the OLC has led to an increasing element of competition for XC soaring with an ever-increasing world wide participation.  It also has led to a competitive drive to get the most OLC points for a given flight and before 2011, when the points were determined by simple distance (discounted for the 4^th and 5^th legs), this gave rise to the preponderance of “Yo-Yo” flights, i. e.

During the recent SOARING EXPO at the Museum of Flight everybody had a chance (again) to get familiar with the Perlan, the pressurized sailplane that Einar Enevoldson and Steve Fosset had envisioned to get soaring to new heights.  Unfortunately this ambitious project – under construction in Bend, Oregon by Windward Performance - that has been designed for flying up to 90,000 ft is now on the backburner because it still needs several million dollars to complete.

Mount Pilchuck (5341 ft high and 17 miles SE of AWO) is one of the more prominent landmarks around Arlington and a favorite waypoint for Evergreen XC pilots in thermalling conditions.  It is also one of the more accessible ridge and wave flying locations available when the winds are blowing and the visibility is adequate.

President’s Notes for January

On January 1 the members of Evergreen Soaring held the annual New Year’s morning breakfast at the AWO clubhouse under cold but clear skies. We welcomed several new members who joined near the end of 2012 and hosted a few prospective members. A few members took a first-of-the-year glider ride behind the towing of JC Hauchecorne. 

The annual awards banquet of the Seattle Glider Council GC) took place on November 3 at the usual place, Ivar's Salmon House on Lake Union.  It was the usual get-together of soaring addicts in the Northwest at the end of the season and it attracted also quite a number of Evergreen members.  Besides swapping old stories about flying experiences and hoped for new achievements the banquet was the occasion to recognize the various achievements and contributions made this year in the greater Seattle area (which sometimes extends to the Region 8).

On October 8 (the second Monday of the month) the OLC 2012 year ended and thus also the WBC 2012. The OLC 2013 started the next day and the long distance specialists Jim Payne and Klaus Ohlmann did not wait too long to post the first 1000+ km flights. And the Richland pilots were the first in Region 8 to enter their first flights.

While the world was mourning the passing away of Neil Armstrong - the first man to set foot on the Moon - as an outstanding test pilot and astronaut, the soaring community is also remembering him as an accomplished soaring pilot. He was not your proverbial brash test pilot; he shunned publicity and was sometimes described as "geekish" before this became an endearing term. To the chagrin of the media, he was more like Charles Lindberg than Chuck Yeager and guarded his privacy to the extent of being labeled a "recluse".