GBSC members volunteered their time last week to help a group of young people learn a little bit about flying. The Civil Air Patrol (CAP), an organization loosely associated with the US Air Force, runs summer camps for high school age people. GBSC sent one tow plane (Bird Dog) and one glider (N1241S) to Danielson, CT for a week. Each day, a team made up of a tow pilot and an instructor volunteered to fly 8-10 flights for the cadets in the program. The results were greatly hindered by absolutely terrible weather. The Monday and Tuesday teams of Jim David/Tony Verhulst and Shawn Brown/Dave Zlotek were washed out by low ceilings and high winds. On Wednesday, John Bergeson/Dave Batson finally got some flights in. John did 19 tows and Dave did 9 instructional flights. An observation- many of the kids had extensively used Microsoft Flight Simulator, and it really showed. Then, on Thursday and Friday, Jeff Orchard/Nancy Lincoln again got washed out. Since they had their RV, they were able to show some soaring related videos to the cadets. Plus their dog, Oreo, met the hangar dog at Danielson. Not what we hoped for, but you can't plan on New England weather.
[End of the soaring report]