Acme Professor Retired

“Deeside Tow, this is Glider Heavy, Roger for Go!”

That’s all the “Tug” pilot needed to thrash the life out of his old but powerful, well maintained radial engine, and off they were trundling across the grass. Yes, the grass that really differentiated gliding club airfield’s from normal tarmac airfields used by normal planes.

The view of the blades of grass becoming a blur, the deftly controlled footwork and quick but smooth hand on the joystick, giving a multitude of small corrections, the alarming jolting and bouncing and banging of the nose wheel along the bumpy grass airstrip, underneath.

“Keep those wings level, and follow that bloody tug, no matter where he’s going, you stay right on his tail”, he said to himself, as he always did.

Suddenly! It all becomes a lot smoother, you are airborne, the tug is veering off directly into the wind, to get as much altitude as possible, to give both aircraft the best possible chances of making it back to the airfield should anything happen, such as the tow wire parting, a hook malfunction, pilot error, engine failure, etc etc plus he is pulling this heavy bastard of a glider, yes they have worked out the specs and the characteristics and done simulations, and trials and gradually worked up to this, but this is for real, this is a dirty weather afternoon, the worst so far.

The tug reduces from full power, the take off phase is completed, now we are cruising to gain height, the clever tug pilots use the natural thermals and possible ridge soaring techniques to gain as much altitude as fast as possible, as inevitably there are a a queue of other gliders awaiting their turn, on the ground patiently hoping the conditions don’t change for the worse, and as usual the gliding is again postponed.

But not today!

Today, there is only one glider flying!

He is in “Heavy One” the first of its kind, designed for this less than perfect weather. All the good weather tests went wonderfully and the few teething problems were sorted out, and the Tug pilot got used to the heavier flying machine behind, and now all the issues were taken care of.

The weather was ominous, darkening clouds and some blustery rainy mixed up weather over the airfield in Aboyne.

The tug had climbed in the blustery weather to the predetermined altitude, the normal, nothing special, so that trainees got used to SOP standard operating procedures.
“Tug Release! Good luck!”

The radio call was visually backed up, by the tug breaking to the left, and gently beginning a dive, that once it was confirmed the glider was indeed released, would become a crazy “Stuka” like banshee race back to the airfield, to beat this crap weather closing in.

The Prof, was sure this was the flying the tug pilots loved the most, unburdened by the tow, they were free to fly those very manoeuvrable and powerful acrobatic planes to their limits, all in the name of “efficiency” to get as many gliders into the air during the good conditions as they could.

“Heavy One, Released! All clear, many thanks, see you on the ground!”

It might have been named heavy, but it still sprang up and gained a few more metres when the tow cable was released, and the tug flew away with it trailing behind it, to be skilfully landed with.

The buffeting of the tow, had been handled easily with the large flaps and control surfaces powered by fly by wire technology making everything easier. The students could have full assistance at first and this could be dialled down to being “very realistic” to even simulating a damaged aircraft, by the instructor sitting in the back, in his raised portion of the canopy in this two seater, instructor version.

So the thunder clap took him by surprise, it had been forecast but not for now… oh dear, it was now manifesting itself into a rapidly expanding cumulonimbus, exactly what gliders stay away from and don’t take off, when they are around.

So, ordeal by fire, so be it.
He slowly turned the aircraft towards the trailing edge of the cloud, a dark ragged edge, that you are always taught to avoid, if you don’t want the wings torn off your glider, but here he was aiming for just that black edge showing where the rain was just starting to come from…

“Whoa!!”

The up-draught still took him by surprise, it was violent, it took him all his skills to control the bucking almost cartwheeling aircraft. He had already turned up all the computer controlled algorithmic software to full assistance, and the aircraft was managing to stay upright, but the altitude measuring altimeter, was screaming a high pitched hum he had never heard, the tone is high in a thermal, and low when you are descending, so you always know if you are in a thermal or ridge wave, and you keep flying in circles or along the ridge, or invisible wave, and you can concentrate on flying rather than staring at the altimeter.