Hombres Pájaro Colombia 2015: Task 3

It was raining on the way to launch, the cloudbase was very low and the morning was cold, very cold; however, we Colombian pilots know very well that none of these signs should discourage us from driving up to launch and so we did.

Pilots set up and the Task Committee decided for a 70km task for the Open Class and a 43km one for the Sport Class. It did not really look promising, but it looked flyable and knowing this magical place, we knew anything was possible.

The main concern was wind on take off. During set up, the wind kept blowing from the back with small windows where we'd get -simultaneously- tail wind at the back and some front wind on the ramp. Critical launch conditions.

Being a new site, we were not exactly sure what would happen. The window opened, but the wind didn't really improve. The Start Gate was moved back by 30 minutes, but the wind did not really improve. The conditions still were not promising.

The situation got to the point where it was not really enough to offer all pilots a safe and fair take off and conditions out there, but if we waited longer it could mean nobody would get to fly. In order to enhance safety, reduce the luck factor and still allow pilots to enjoy a flyable, but maybe not raceable day, the task was stopped and automatically invalidated (according to S7A rules).

As a big joke, a couple of minutes after it was stopped, the wind started blowing from the front and, as the minutes went by, the wind increased and the conditions for launch improved; however, the soaring conditions became weaker as the launch conditions improved. Most of the pilots, except 7 pilots were still able to go for a free flight and enjoyed the day.

We've had 4 flying days and 2 Tasks, not bad, still accomplishing what we came here to do: HANG GLIDE!

Tomorrow will be another day....

Christian Castro sent us some pictures: