A Saturday in The Sky The cast:
Fast Eddie - driver extraordinaire – He’s pro in everyway. His knowledge of the sky, the clouds, the terrain and how it all relates to the flying day is incredible. He studies the areas and knows all the ins and outs so there’s never a question regarding retrieve. Retrieve will arrive and arrive as quickly as possible. They don’t call him “Fast Eddie” for nothing.
Tony Deleo a.k.a. “EL DIABLO” – The ultimate mileage junky. It’s all about going and going as far as humanly possible. He’s the man and it’s important to listen to his knowledge.
Bob “YNA”– The guy that always appears so disorganized and never seems to have his shit together but he always pulls off some kind of great flight. His hang glider has parts that have been changed, moved and even removed. His wing has been stitched here and glued there or maybe that was duck tape (does he own 3M stock?). It seems that Bob was shanghaied by Captain Morgan and crew. He looked a strange color of green on the way up the hill which put him at a distinct disadvantage.
And then there’s me- Robert (HHShark) Millington or just Hammer – My friends know that I am very much the retentive type. That certainly wasn’t the case on this day. The only thing I did right was, listen to Tony and wear the right coat
First, I didn’t bring my O2. “We’ll never get that high, it’s not that kind of day” and of course, I punch off and immediately climb up to 14 grand. Oops! After the initial climb out I realize the valve from my camel back is hanging behind me and there is no way for me to reach it. Good thing I had six lbs of water that I couldn’t drink on this 6-hour flight. Oops. Again?!!
Not only that but my PTT had fallen in the dirt while I was setting up and I didn’t bring my spare. It didn’t seem to be a problem, since it worked fine during my flight check. But as is the case with PTTs, it got stuck and I was keying and not aware of it for quit a while. I later learned that I did a total head-trip on Bob A. (YNA) and I have the same vario. My keyed radio and vairo sounds along with Bob’s previously mentioned condition had him quite confused. There he is turning in what he thought was killer lift and ended up being major sink because the sweet vario sounds he was hearing telling him he was in this great lift was really coming from my vario through my keyed PTT. So much for the guy with the hangover getting a break.
The Flight
Details available at http://www.paraglidingforum.com/leonardo/flight/271550
The first challenge with any flight from Pine is to get high enough to go over the back. You normally need to get at least 1000’ or 2000’ over launch to go over the back but you always want more. With launch at 7000’, going over at 8000’ or 9000’ and not getting anything more, is just enough to get you deep into the badlands, which is very uncomfortable. At the very least it leads to a lot of work and at worst a premature landing. Diablo and I climbed to 14k above launch which made the “badlands” a moot point. Bob A. bounced around at 500 over for a while then climbed to 8900’, flew the ridge East to Reyes peak then beamed out to 13k.
Once over the back, the next point to make is Guillermo, which is at the western edge of Lockwood Valley. From Guillermo, the next point is Frazier Mountain, which is only about 20 something miles out on course. Basically, if you can get to Guillermo you can get to Frasier. It’s after Frazier that the challenge begins. We all bee-lined to Guillermo, then Frazier only stopping at those two points.
The hardest part about getting miles from Pine Mountain is traversing the first 20 – 30 miles of the Antelope Valley. It’s here, after leaving Frazier Mountain, that you really need to be very aware, lucky, and in my case have Diablo out in front telling you where the convergence line is. This is the area of California that is tied up in a knot geologically speaking. Because of all this very active terrain meeting here the orographic effect on the atmosphere is immense. There can be great convergence but you have to be able to read valley flows, clouds (if they exist) and the terrain carefully to find the convergence seams. This day we had some clouds marking the lift and Tony would just see the cloud and just go to it. The ATOS is so fast all I could do was try to follow.
I was able to connect with a convergence line off the Liebre Mountains because of my knowledge, my ability to read the sky, years of experience, great skill, and because Tony came on the radio and said, “Hey dummy, there’s a great convergence lift line forming off the Liebre Mountains.” I think I’ll go there! Duh!
After making the connection through the Liebre Mountains, the next part of the journey from Neenach to Helendale was pretty scrappy for me. It’s a stretch of about 70 miles and I spent most of the time struggling low and scooping thermals off the deck. And then I heard “him”, the voice of “EL DIABLO”, announcing his location and altitude. As I was struggling, I could hear Diablo reporting his position and learned that the distance between us continued to increase and his altitude was always much higher than mine. I was being left in the dust and getting more and more frustrated.
Just as my frustration was at an all time high for the flight, once again the voice of El DIABLO announces: “It gets much better the closer you get to Helendale.” And as is always the case with El DIABLO, he was right. Once in Helndale, I managed to climb back to 13 and change and head off towards the Ord Mountains away from roads. Being the timid pilot that I tend to be, I didn’t go as deep into the Ords as El DIABLO. A safe place to land just looked too far away from that line. Since I had such poor communication with my PPT not working well at all by this time, I thought he said we were going to follow the I-40 but it was really the I-15 we were going to follow. I was heading down the I-40 when I again hear El DIABLO and learn that I needed to change coarse as he was heading down the I-15 and not the I-40. It took me a long time to recover from that mistake. My tail was stuck firmly between my legs and I was running for safety. Then El DIABLO must have sensed this and the radio came to life, “Follow the Clouds Young Man: Stay with the Clouds.” So I trusted these words of wisdom from the master and of course this worked!
Well, it worked till a point. Due to PPT issues and lack of understanding of terrain, I finally threw in the towel and turned off course line, which was a very intimidating. I was heading toward Baker Valley to look for a road to land by. Low and behold coming into the southern end of Baker Valley I see what appears to be a road that I could land by but realize it’s not a road but a dike and there are no roads to be found. I think about the 10-mile walk ahead of me if I don’t make Baker. Fortunately, I made it.
Knowing Tony as I do, I knew he would be flying for many more hours and I could be waiting in No-Mans land for a very long, long time. I wanted to make the town of Baker so I could at least wait in comfort, with A/C and a cold drink at the Bun Boy or the Mad Greeks. I landed at the Baker airport and didn’t even have time to get my harness off when Eddie and Bob showed up and I was saved. It was a cool 102 out, and the sun was starting to set.
We ended the day by driving out to 233-mile mark and picking up El DIABLO at Prim in Nevada, not far from Las Vegas.
The record
- A few years back Tony and I flew to Furnace Creek in Death Valley and set a new record of 186 miles for
both rigid and flex wings.
- Last year Tony flew 225 from Pine setting a new rigid wing record.
- Today Tony and I broke our own records by a tiny amount.
- Rigid wing old record 225, new record 233 by Tony (counting dog leg, Searchlight to Prim 253)
- Flex wing old record 186, new record 190 by me (counting dog leg, wilderness back to Baker 205)
Tony is always very generous and is willing and eager to share his knowledge with any pilot who is interested. You don’t have to want to fly 233 miles but every pilot would benefit from his extensive knowledge if they were going to fly cross-country. Take advantage of this unique opportunity and the next time Tony posts he’s flying, go along for the ride. Be prepared for a long day that you won’t regret.
The details:
190 Miles in 6hr, 6min, 56 sec
Max Altitude 14,200, Max climb 1892, Max sink 1344, Max air speed 45, Avg. MPH 31.6
Nice tail wind!!!
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A great day of flying in the mountain...$60 in gas.
Not driving your fellow pilots crazy by keying your mic...$80 for a new PTT
Being able to fly 190 miles in 6 hours 7 minutes, 32 seconds and pimping off Diablo...Priceless
(You wouldn’t be reading this but for the great help of Marge and YNA. Thanks!)
