Outlanding stories

Chester SC, USA late 80s. Couldn't quite make the final glide home.
Knowing that there were plenty of landable fields approaching from the
NE, I pushed on lower, hoping.... I spotted a familiar golf course and
decided to pack it in. Golf courses are not typically choice spots for
such operations but the driving range had a nice flat expanse with an
approach between the trees. I knew that it was short and would require
good airspeed control and heavy braking.

A quick turn, short final and touchdown in front of a half dozen
startled golfers. A little fast with lousy brakes contributed to
overrunning the planned landing area. A nicely contoured drainage
ditch brought me to an abrupt but safe stop with the nose resting on the
opposite side of the ditch. No problem, I know the drill. Beyond being
****ed off, all is well.

I walk up to the clubhouse and ask for a phone. The curious are asking
questions. I try to hold back the competitive bitching and answer the
usual questions.

"Hey, you know another glider did the same thing here last year?"

"Really"

"Yeah, in fact there's a picture of it over here on the bulletin board."

"You don't say..."

"Why heck, that's you!"

"Yes it is (you SOB)"

.... and don't you know I pinned the glider in the same ditch in exactly
the same way.

Bill "Foureyes" Watson

bagmaker wrote:
OK, Ive not done one.
Been checked out, approved and even go to the "all ready to break my
outlanding virginity" stage during many flights -only to be saved by a
low thermal or afternooon crop fire. So, outlanding is an interesting
idea that I am sure to come to grips with soon enough, weather (not)
permitting.
Who has the best stories of outlanding around? Long walks, cold nights,
new friends/lovers -nothing horrific please- crop damage, ego damage,
bugs, all that stuff.
I cant wait!
Wayne Carter

Wow....lots of great stories!

My most memorable one was when a bunch of folks from Arizona were flying out
of Parowan a few years ago. We all headed north on a great day and on the
way home we agreed on the next turn out to the southwest. I headed out
there only to later find out that the rest of them (behind me) decided it
was overdeveloping and with rain starting went more toward Parowan. After
finding that out and not finding lift also headed that way. They all landed
at Beaver, UT and I was cut off by a wall of rain and virga. I found some
half kt lift over a trash fire and finally had enough altitude to get
through the virga and with them all on the ground decided to do a low pass
at the airport. They all lined up and mooned me as I came over.

Uneventful landing only to have several sheriffs cars pull in soon
thereafter. Turns out that the only house on the airport was occupied by a
nice Mormon lady that was of course appalled at the sight of all of those
white behinds and so called the sheriff. Also by then one of the crews had
arrived and there were many beverages being imbibed. We assured the sheriff
that the nice lady must have been mistaken and that none of us drinking were
going to drive and so they left.

Another similar story happened when once again 8 of us got cut off by storms
over a town west of Turf (Aguila). The entire town is made up of small
airport communities and we landed at the nicest one. After securing our
gliders one guy who had a hangar full of BD-5's, invited us to his beautiful
home where he made us some of the strongest margaritas I've ever tasted.
Luckily we all had crews since I'm sure that none of us could have driven.
Even taking the gliders apart was a challenge!

Casey Lenox
KC
Phoenix

One of my favorites from JJ, try this link:

http://www.valleysoaring.net/story/jj/jj-torch.html

4I

Didn't you get invited to go skinny dippin' on one of your landouts?

KK

"Ken Kochanski (KK)" wrote in message
ups.com...
4I

Didn't you get invited to go skinny dippin' on one of your landouts?

KK


A story related by one of my hang gliding compadres a few years back....

Has a nice long downwind flight and has no worries since his trusty crew is
waiting for his phone call but its before the cell phone era so has to find
a phone after landing in a nice plowed field. Sees a farm house at the edge
of the field so heads there. After opening a nice white gate in the fence
he proceeds into the backyard of the house where he sees an 80 year old
woman buck naked in a lounge chair drooling on herself. OK now what would
you do? Dare to go and knock on the door or hightail it outta there? He
choose the latter.

KC

wrote:

I managed to landout after a 5 minute flight in my 1:48 glide ratio LAK
12 - two fields away from the airfield.

Given that outline, it must be an amazing story.


Jack

I heard of someone landed out AFTER going thru the finish gate...

Ramy

wrote in message
ups.com...
Two landouts on the same day. Contest task, landed out (at a
gliderport) while on course, got a tow and rejoined the gaggle on the
return leg, then landed out again (along with just about everybody
else!) when a cloud deck moved in and shut off all lift.

Second landout was in a wheat field, requiring many of the classical
landout "events": hike out to find a farmer, challenge of meeting up
with new crew (pre-cell days), midnight derig and carry-out of glider
from middle of field, etc...

Bags of fun!

Jack wrote:
wrote:

I managed to landout after a 5 minute flight in my 1:48 glide ratio LAK
12 - two fields away from the airfield.

Given that outline, it must be an amazing story.


Jack

I winch launched with a wall of dust approaching the field. I did two
turns in a broken thermal that I lost, and then headed diagonally away
from the field towards the dust. I had such strong sink in front of the
dust wall that I dropped the undercarriage. I then hit the dust wall
and climbed about 500'. As I passed through the dust wall - it felt as
if the glider was in free fall. The only field that I could reach had
large furrows and the wind direction was across them. As I lined up to
land, the wind dropped and I could turn and land between the furrows
with no damage to the glider. My friend who took the cable just before
me climbed to 15 000'. Africa can be quite intimidating at times.

Clinton
LAK 12

Yeah, but it was the wrong landout.

Beautiful spot though... flying out of Elmira I spotted a perfect field.
A flat, nicely mowed lawn on the top of a small hill. A clear
approach path, house, pool, and a guy sitting on his back step (before
cell phones, the fact that someone was home was significant).

An easy approach, perfect landing, a roll-up to the back of the house.
Oddly, the guy watches me land, stands up, and goes in the house. Hmmm,
this must happen here every day. I slowly get out, look out for dogs,
and keep waiting for the guy to re-emerge. Nothing happens so I walk up
to the door and knock. A husband and wife answer the door. I point out
the glider not 100 feet away and ask to use the phone. No problem.

After the usual pleasantries I take the guy out to the plane and he
confides that he was sitting outside hiding from his wife so he could
drink! I swear not to tell. The guy is pretty well fortified at this
point but when we return, he offers me a drink. By the time my crew
shows up, we're all 3 sitting around the pool, several drinks
downstream, watching the sunset. My brother had come along for his
first retrieve and thought he now understood why we liked soaring so
much. We were all invited to take a nude swim but we decided there was
nothing to be gained....do you guys have a pool KK?

Thanks for the memories!

Ken Kochanski (KK) wrote:
4I

Didn't you get invited to go skinny dippin' on one of your landouts?

KK

One of my favorites was in my 1-26 I touched down and came to a stop
just in a field just across the road from a convienence store. Got out
walked across the street and bought myselft a sandwich and a pop to
enjoy while I wanted for my trailer to show up. I had been parked in
the feild for about 45 minutes when an police car showed up. The office
got out and asked me if I was the pilot and if anyone was hurt. After
telling him I was the pilot and there were no injuries he went back to
his car and radioed to cancel the Fire engines and Ambulance, Which
showed up about 3 minutes later anyway because they wanted to see what
was going on. After explaining to them that I had just made a normal
landing and waiting for my crew they all went back to there vehicals to
figure out how to write their reports about responding to guy eating
lunch while sitting in a field with a glider