Thursday, July 11, 2013

On their way to what looks like a difficult Day 9

I posted an update this morning because I was expecting that we would sit on the grid for quite a while before I could post again. Indeed, we did. The original launch time of 1:00 PM got postponed, 15 minutes by 15 minutes, all the way to 3:00 PM. During this process, the task was first changed to task B, a TAT of 2:45 hr, then the task time was reduced to 2:15 hr and the radius of the second area was increased to 30 Km. Finally, the sniffer found enough reliable lift to give it a go.
Gate opening for the Club Class was 15:28. A few Cu had appeared early on in the Southern sector, but it is now totally blue. Max altitude seems to be just below 1100 m (3300 ft). The wind at the ground is about 10-15 kt, gusting 20 kt.
All of them left within a 12-minute window between 15:50 and 16:02, probably because of the expected gaggling that takes place on such a blue day but also because the 2:15 hr task will stretch the task past 6:00 PM, which is quite late given the expected convection of the day.
The challenge will be the return into the wind late in the day. One good news, if good really is the word here, is that the harvesting has been in full swing during the last couple of days, and about 30% of the fields now appear landable.

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