On Wednesday, 10 December, I finally reached a goal I’ve long dreamed of and prepared for; winter-wave-soaring the Cascades volcano crossing from Mt Hood to Mt Jefferson (and return). <https://www.onlinecontest.org/olc-3.0/gliding/flightinfo.html?flightId=186235709> First, citations: this crossing has of course been made before by other pilots: Rolf Koenenkamp told me he had soared Hood-to-Jeff in wave rather […]
Kelly Cooper: Well yesterday turned out to be a fun day soaring around our playground. Brett, Tim and myself found a little patch of wave near Mount Hood topped out at 7500 ft. We got a call on the radio from Greg that he was in the Underwood wave climbing through 8000 feet. Tim flew
New Years Eve day held an interesting array of unique situations and challenges for Brian and myself, as we piloted his Super Ximango through the Noth American Alpines. The original plan was to takeoff from Hood River, and make a course due south, towards Mt Jefferson, climbing enroute, with oxygen, and see how much altitude
The Saturday Academy is officially happening. This morning, myself, Ori, Isabel, Banyan, Jacob, and Brian met at the clubhouse bright and early. We had a great time discussing lift, pre-solo tests, and just flying in general while eating breakfast/brunch. We headed to the airport at about 12 o’clock and began preflighting the gliders. Every airworthy
The Dog Bowl Prevailing winds blow northwest over Hood River. The east valley ridge obstructs the airmass making it rise like river water climbing over a boulder. When the terrain is shaped like a bowl, a larger volume of air converges generating a bigger upward push. Bowls also collect heat on sunny days, adding
Silver Badge Flight Not to torture anyone with more details, but I figured I might as well document yesterday’s flight, since it was as much a surprise to me and a good example of a dissipating inversion ending up behaving exactly as predicted (or at least guessed). “Never give in, never give in, never, never,
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The winter here in the Columbia River Gorge is coming to an end soon and I can’t wait! I’m happy to have a couple of months off from soaring. It’s nice to take a break, look at some photos and recall some good memories of people and adventures you had. It’s also great to have the time to