Tuesday was cloudy and blown out, day was cancelled. Reports of heavy rains in Seattle and on the coast in general, stayed dry on this side of the mountains!
Today (Wednesday) was sunny and post frontal, but the winds were still too strong for a task, so after sitting up on the Butte for an hour or so, the day was cancelled.
A few pilots decided to stay on launch in case the winds died down later on. The rest of us went back down and did various things. I showed some pilots the airport ridge flying site and it was blowing in straight. However you could see the gusts coming off the river, when they hit it gusted to 35 kph. A bit too strong for launching there, especially when you consider the row of power lines right behind launch (no dragging allowed!).
About 6:30pm the gusts on launch were more reasonable so 4 of us launched...Mark, Deryk, Brett, and myself. It had actually lulled on launch so much that it was almost forward-able, but once in the air it was still plenty lifty. Flew around for about 30 minutes and then turned downwind to land next to our tents at the airport. Very sweet to launch, fly, and be back to your own vehicle, all in one hour!
I'm not sure if anyone else flew today...it was windy and gusty enough at the airport ridge that I imagine it was way too strong to launch from the Butte. But Martin et al were towing at Mansfield so it was probably good on the Flats today.
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