It seems as if most of the country has been suffering through the same bout of bad weather that we have had here in Minnesota during the month of June. So it probably comes as no surprise that any opportunity, no matter how remote, to get in the sky will have an unreasonable effect on a pilot.

The forecast for this last weekend called for one ok (lower case) and one rainout day. The weather wizards were unsure of which due to timing, jet stream, sunspots, you know all the qualifiers they use to validate their accuracy no matter how it actually turns out. Well, Saturday dawned early (5:30am) with clear blue skies and 10-15mph wind out of the NNW. Usually, a wind this early will mean a blow out by noon. The forecast at 6am said NNW at 10-20. Those familiar with this area know that this forecast causes a HG pilot to perk-up and have thoughts of Frontenac.

Frontenac is a five mile 400' ridge on the south bank of Lake Pepin. Lake Pepin is a wide spot in the Mississippi River between Red Wing and Lake City, Minnesota and the originating launch of the state record HG flight of 135 miles (Bruce Case). This site is interesting in that there is no beach, shore, clearing, no anything, along its entire bottom, except water, cold, deep, moving water. The closes lower spot is a 10 foot strip of sand in front of some 50' trees 2 mile west of launch. We all know how well gliders and water get along, so you can understand why we don't launch until we are positive of going up. This is the easy part of the flying decision to make at Frontenac. The landing is really different in that almost every rule ingrained in a pilot about ridges and rotors are broken. The LZ is a 200' strip of rolling (50' hills) terrain right behind the edge of the ridge/drop-off. Did I mention that this edge also has 30-40' trees on it also? Behind this strip are fields of planted crops (corn, beans) that are forbidden zones. The game plan on landing is to fly out over the lake and work down to a point below the top of the trees on the ridge. Then fly at the ridge (below the top) and as you hit the lift band pop up over the trees, turn 90 degrees, blast through the rotor into the still air of the tree lines wind shadow, bleeding airspeed and landing before you run out of real estate. The entry speed for this maneuver is in the 35-50 mph range depending on the wind. This site has seen many a pilot plow earth with there noseplate. And no, we don't yell "whack", because a successful landing is deemed one where the pilot and glider are together and intact, even if some portion(s) there of have touched terra firma. For these reasons this site is rated as H4 with proven top landing ability and experience.

So, why with all of these obstacles to flight would pilots flock here. Well, it's really neat (What a wordsmith.), you can see the air moving across the lake, you can see where air masses are going to converge, there are eagles, hawks, barges, yachts, sailboats, trees (autumn is awesome - I should sell this gingle.) and lotsa room to boat around.

But, alas on this day the forecast would be wrong and the experience wouldn't happen. Boy (justa expression), did we put in the time waiting, but the wind rarely topped 10mph. Which is a little light to commit aviation at this site.

Ah, but when Sunday dawned it was overcast, raining with visible thunder in the area. Just because the forecasters (they hate being called that) were wrong yesterday they weren't going to blow it two days in a row. So, I pretty much wrote the day off and got going on the things around the house that are lower on my Maslow's hierarchy. About noon I came up out of the basement and noticed shadows. Being a very quick person, I though, wow, the sun must be out. I nonchalantly walked around the house (Not through it, as this would send a telltale message to my very observant spouse) and looked at the windsock mounted in the backyard. Heeemmm...a south-southeast breeze, didn't they forecast a northeast wind. Having gone completely cyber/wired/on-line/connected, I would not believe this until I could have verification from a electronic source, so I called the AWOS at the Red Wing Airport and it said 130 at 5 knots, pretty cross for Hager, but maybe it was going to swing to the NW (suggested by the clearing conditions) the long way. I called the AWOS back in 5 minutes and it was 150 at 7 knots. Hager City is very soarable at 170 and 8 knots for a PG. This usually translates into a 15-20 mph compression zone velocity at launch.

Have I mentioned that I had just gotten a brand new Saber and due to conditions had only gotten a couple of sled runs on it. Having completed a reasonable number of chores and with the sun out, the radar not showing any rain in the area and I having rented the video "Sebrina" for Marlys (my wife) while at Blockbuster earlier that morning, I decided to go for a drive(my euphemism for flying). Yes, the gods were with me.

I loaded up and booked. The telltales on the way down were not promising. The flags were limp and showed a slight SE drift to the air. But, what the hey, at least I can probably get another couple of sledders.

As I drove into the LZ and planted the windsock I could see that the wind was stronger and had good direction, top and bottom. I loaded my gear onto the tram and hit the up button. As I ascended the bluff I noticed that the wind seemed to be working the entire face top to bottom, usually the river valley effect causes a stagnation that blocks the wind from the lower half to a third of the ridge face giving a smaller effective ridge height. But not today. All the vegetation was moving, I thought that it may be blown out. It's amazing how different the conditions were within a 40 mile area out here in flyover territory.

Having reached the top, I checked the windspeed, it was in the 8-12 mph range. Nice, but with the the humidity and temp (high density altitude note on the AWOS) questionable as to soarable. I spread out, hooked in, pulled up and lifted off. This was great, good lift, manageable wind and thermals moving through. This being the first soaring flight on this wing I was feeling very conservative in style and assertiveness, but compared to a Space this is a nimble, fast ship and it was hard not to take advantage of those characteristics. I kept my turns to half a cheek and the waist to biner range (brakes). I had a lot of fun. As the sky cleared the wind increased and I found myself going to the bar deeper and more often. I could only get about half the travel, it needed adjustment, so with about 50 minutes under my belt I headed for the LZ. The air was active and having read Will Gadd's Idaho posting and comments on landing, I grabbed some ears and took the wing in to a fitting finish for a fine flight. I bagged the wing and headed for home, within 10 minutes the sky opened and rain poured. Timing, timing, timing.......

Pat Caulfield

p.s. There is an image of the Frontenac launch on the HG WWW Site in the January 1995 picture archive. Tootles.

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