On Friday, May 1, 2020 at 7:15:18 PM UTC+1, john firth wrote:
On Saturday, April 4, 2020 at 2:40:32 PM UTC-4, wrote:
Maybe this is a good opportunity for some of us to share some stories of our experiences.
I'll go first.-

During the regional at Harris Hill in 2013 I was flying K21 with grandson Calvin Mampe, Rachel Conklin, and her sister Michelle. All 3 had flown multiple contests with me before, 2 having done so before they were old enough to solo.
Half way through the contest, my wife Dianne had a terrible fall and ended up hospitalized with some very serious injuries. All 3 of the juniors had good flights with me earlier in the contest so I told them to just keep on flying.
On Friday, Calvin and Rachel flew but decided to abandon the task part way around the course due to rain. They did not want to land out and take the ship apart in the rain. Smart!
The next day Rachel and Michelle flew together. About 4:00 I was in the ICU with Dianne when Calvin called. When I answered, he simply said “K21 four miles”. Our 2 young ladies had flown the course for a reasonable score. To my knowledge, this is the first time two young sisters had ever flown in competition. We had a seriously great group hug that night. This may be my best ever moment as a supporter of youth soaring.
Following up- Michelle is now an A&P working for Textron and just finished her first restoration, a 1-26E. Rachel is instructing at Flight Safety and soon will have all the requirements for her ATP.

UH

This is often called "thermal wave" as it seems to need thermals to
get it going; it used to be a fairly frequent occurence in Eastern Canada
in the '70s and 80s.
In 1977 on a day with cloud streets at 7000 ft, I transitioned into
weak wave at cloudbase. It got better high up and I was still climbing 2kts
at 16K; the Cu had become lennies stretching as far as one could see.
I published a paper with the met. details at the 1978 Ostiv conf..

Despite regular flying in the last 20 years, I have not encountered
any thermal wave since! Climate change?

John Firth

I don't think that shear wave is necessarily dependent on thermals below it.. I have seen otherwise inexplicable clearly delineated shear wave in the early mornings over flat central South Africa long before the thermals got going. This upper wave system persisted after the thermals started but the base of it, and top of the thermals, were above the 14500ft (10,000 agl) airspace limit.