THE HISTORY OF V.A.R.M.S The Annual Diary 1990 - 2009

110
to the front of the queue and the flightline controller bellows,
‘NEXT’. ‘Flair, or Loop’ he enquires, referring to your preferred method of towing
attachment. ‘Er, Flair’ you might say. ‘Not on this tug’, he replies, try the next one
over’. With a sudden roar, the next one over takes off with a glider on tow, You hear a
shout: ‘Tug landing, you’re in the way, glider pilot, please move back”.
You move back as a tug burbles and swishes its’ way on to the patch, an elderly gent
earnestly asks you if you have seen Mabel.
‘Flair?’... the flight line controller beckons you forward. You grab the proffered ball and
attempt to stuff it in the hole in the front of your glider.
‘Glider landing!’ comes a shout followed by another, different voice: ‘Glider landing...’
Bump, swish, rumble, a sleek glass ship comes to rest in front of the tug. The pilot starts
to run forward to retrieve his precious creation, but is halted by a stentorian bellow:
‘GLIDER LANDING’, please keep to the bottom half of the patch’.
Faced with a rapidly diminishing area in which to land, the glider pilot tries to change
direction, but catches a wing tip in the long grass and ground loops. With a sudden roar
another tug heads skywards with its charge hanging on behind, and the two glider pilots
rush out to retrieve. After much fumbling, you still haven’t managed to connect your glider
to the line, and a tide of red slowly rises up your face, as the people in the queue behind
shuffle and stand impatiently. Finally, the job is done, and you stand next to the tug pilot
whilst someone else authoritively holds your wingtip clear of the ground. That someone
else turns out to be the elderly gent .... he looks under your starboard wing.
‘Mabel’, he quavers, ‘are you under there?’
‘OK?’ The godly figure of the tug pilot enquires, kindly, well mostly they’re kind. As you
nod nervously, he calls ‘all out’ and the tug and glider waltz merrily off down the patch. If
there’s a slight tailwind and your glider is heavy, if the temperature is high and the tug’s
engine is sucking comparatively less oxygen, then those first few seconds can be pretty
crowded. If your anhedralled gull-wing’s tips barely clear the ground to start with, then the
first task is to apply the necessary physic guesswork on the aileron stick to keep them
clear, the second is get the thing off the ground before the tug overrruns into the long
grass. Once airborne, things become easier and it’s usually a fairly simple ride up to
altitude.
Skipping lightly over the period of soaring, you’ve lost the lift and now the model is getting
larger and larger. Another glider is undergoing the same experience, and is stooging
about at the same altitude.
‘Tug landing’, shouts a voice, ‘is the patch clear?’ ‘Are you coming down now?’ asks
the other glider pilot, ‘cos I think I’m gonna have to...’
It becomes obvious that Mr. Gravity is asking both gliders for repayment of all outstanding
sums.
‘Me to’ you reply.
‘Tug landing’, says yet another voice, ‘is that tug clear?’
‘Dunno’ replies the flight line controller (bet you’d forgotten about him) ‘there’s a damn
great glider pilot in the way!’
A hand guides you gently out of the way, just as your final circling coincides with the other
guy’s and what looks like a potentially nasty mid-air passes off without incident. You
decide that enough is enough, and push the stick forward and the spoilers out in an