Skyline Soaring Club wraps up a spotless flying season—no accidents, no injuries—with a January issue that reads like a highlight reel of the sport at its best. Brian Collins delivers a gripping first-person account of a 6½-hour ridge-and-wave flight out of Julian, Pennsylvania, climbing to nearly 18,000 feet in a 100-knot jet stream, executing a 120-mile final glide at an average 110 mph, and learning the hard way that wave clouds are not as stationary as they appear. The club's members also lent their expertise to the Space Shuttle Columbia accident investigation team, four teenagers who started soaring at 14 all found their way to solo (including Dan Noonan's crosswind solo in the ASK-21), and Steve Wegner finally tamed a LAK-12 that had been waiting for him two years. Carlos Roberts offers a thorough winter-reading guide to PC-based soaring simulators, from Microsoft Flight Simulator add-ons to the then-new Sailors of the Sky and the beta-version Silent Wings. The National Soaring Museum reports progress on a motion-platform Schweizer 1-26B simulator, and the issue closes with Jim Kellett's trademark Curmudgeon's Corner, a welcome for new member Craig Sutherland, and a reminder that the club's annual party at the Canary House in Clifton was, in the president's words, the kind of event you simply have to be there for.
This February 2005 issue of Skylines leads with a detailed technical analysis by Judah Milgram comparing the climb performance of the SGS 1-26E, LS-8A, and Schleicher K-8b across four Horstmann thermal models, challenging conventional glider handicapping indices and suggesting that lighter, slower gliders can outperform the LS-8 in narrow thermals. President George Hazelrigg introduces the new Board of Directors—Shane Neitzey, Kolie Lombard, Chris Groshel, Rick Harris, and Fred Winter—and announces it will be his final year at the helm, outlining a seven-point legacy plan that includes establishing a stable base at Front Royal, launching a youth program, and formalizing ground operations training. The issue also covers the club's annual safety meeting on February 19, a flight instructor recertification class held at MCI's Dulles hangar, a review of Charlie Spratt's memoir *See ya' at the airport!*, a look at rare Italian WWII glider pilot badges, and a humorous side-by-side comparison of soaring and automotive safety rhetoric by Jim Kellett.
The March 2005 issue of Skylines kicks off the new soaring season at Front Royal with President George Hazelrigg's call for better relations with power pilots, a revived social program, and a reminder of the club's ongoing political work with the Warren County Board of Supervisors. Steve Wallace reports back from a self-initiated checkout flight in a Schweizer 2-32 at Dillingham Airport, Oahu, complete with spins over the Pacific, a simulated rope break at 300 feet, and a closing martini on the veranda of the Moana Hotel where, he claims, he was conceived. Judah Milgram issues a blunt propeller-safety bulletin, while Jim Kellett marvels at the glass-cockpit, motorglider, and computer-driven world he encountered at a winter soaring convention. The issue's most sobering piece, Ron Hansen's 'Four First's and a Funeral,' recounts a fatal winch-launch accident at a German soaring club that killed a young, experienced pilot on his first tow in a newly purchased high-performance glider. Rounding out the newsletter are humorous safety-meeting photographs by Dick Otis, a birth announcement, an obituary for aviation writer Ted Park, and word that Fred LaSor will be managing operations at Soar Minden beginning in April.
This April 2005 issue of Skylines is anchored by a remarkable dual-life story: Skyline tow pilot Steve Wallace, who also served on the 13-member Columbia Accident Investigation Board, presented the shuttle's fatal foam-strike sequence to two separate gatherings of local pilots, walking them through the data that revealed how a two-pound piece of insulation doomed seven astronauts. The newsletter also reports a major political victory at Front Royal–Warren County Airport, where the entire Airport Commission resigned amid a bitter standoff with airport users, leaving manager Reggie Cassagnol to report directly to the County Board of Supervisors while the club navigates a new self-sufficiency mandate and the contentious Based-Aircraft Fee. Other highlights include a Warren Sentinel reporter's first glider ride (and her dog Sasha's ground-level tow), a donated LS-4 display and auction at the Trinity Stars Gala benefiting a Falls Church school, news that the FAA has finally approved restricted Pawnees for tow duty, and word that Minden Soaring's Gordon Boettger may have set a new U.S. distance record with an estimated 1,130-mile Easter flight. The issue closes with the club's social season launching at an open cookout and a friendly plea from the editor for members to share their stories, photos, and plane-for-sale listings with the newsletter.
May 2005 brings a full slate of activity to Skyline Soaring Club. The centerpiece is Dave Weaver's vivid report from a two-day soaring seminar at the Penn State Conference Center, where two-time World Champion George Moffat urged pilots to make a decision every two minutes or be 'loafing,' 17-time National Champion Karl Striediek revealed his habit of flying a constant airspeed rather than chasing the McCready indicator, and Michael Bird—better known to SSA Convention regulars as 'Platypus'—compared improving one's flying to learning the cello. The seminar also covered Gel Cell battery care, composite sailplane repair via the German glider repair school, ELT and survival equipment requirements, and a Reynolds-number aerodynamics lecture that concluded with the memorable fact that the Reynolds number for sperm is 1. On the club front, President George Hazelrigg issues a pointed call for roster discipline as summer training ramps up, and longtime Treasurer Bob Collier hands the keys to Dan Noonan, a retired Merchant Marine master with 27 years at sea. Richard Freytag organizes a rare off-field landing training day at Craig Hageman's High View strip, and the club points members toward a free public tour of NOAA's P-3 Orion 'Hurricane Hunter' at Richmond International Airport on May 4. The issue closes with notices of the Vintage Sailplane Association rally in Manning, South Carolina, and the International Vintage Sailplane Meet at Harris Hill, Elmira, in August.
This issue of Skyline Soaring Club's newsletter delivers a remarkable spread of aviation storytelling. President George Hazelrigg recounts a nail-biting May 14 session in which the crew sealed the hangar doors a mere five seconds before 80-mph winds, hail, and near-zero visibility tore through the field, and urges members to join newly formed Warren County airport management committees. Fred LaSor, flying in Minden, Nevada, describes a harrowing wave flight in which he and a student were blown into a dense rotor cloud at 23,000 feet and survived by executing a benign spiral, emerging at 12,000 feet after being carried six miles off course. George Hazelrigg Jr. contributes a vivid, long-form account of his 1996 stint as Station Science Leader at the South Pole, detailing LC-130 crossings over the Transantarctic Mountains, the quirks of life at 90 degrees south, and the neutrino-detection project buried five thousand feet in the ice. The issue also reports Minden Soaring Club member Gordon Boettger's declared 2,056-kilometre three-turn wave flight, one of the three longest soaring flights ever recorded in North America; a successful instructional fly-in to the Hageman family's High View Farms strip, where a nine-year-old nearly claimed flight of the day; Dave Weaver's humorous tale of an accidentally activated ELT that summoned a multi-jurisdiction police response on a Pennsylvania highway; and the obituary of longtime aviation figure Pete Bryce, who died in May at age 77.
The July 2005 issue of Skylines is a busy summer dispatch from the Skyline Soaring Club. Editor Phil Jordan, who also serves as Art Director at the U.S. Postal Service Stamp Development Office, details the upcoming dedication of the American Advances in Aviation commemorative stamp sheet at EAA AirVenture Oshkosh on July 29, featuring ten classic aircraft from the 1930s through the 1950s—including the B-29 Superfortress, P-47 Thunderbolt, and Beechcraft 35 Bonanza—painted by artist William S. Phillips. The issue also carries a dramatic notice that Mars will make its closest approach to Earth in recorded history on August 27, a sight no living person will likely see again. Club life fills the remaining pages: President George Hazelrigg reports from Chengdu, China, where 90-degree heat, heavy smog, and a lack of suitable landout sites have made soaring a distant dream; a black bear makes an uninvited appearance on Runway 9 during the Father's Day crowd; and the editor declares it the club's first annual photo issue, showcasing members in Citabrias, Grobs, and a K-14 over the Chesapeake and the Colorado high country. Phil Jordan also shares a nostalgic personal essay tracing his path from a wide-eyed eleven-year-old on a DC-3 to an amateur pilot finally strapped into an AT-6 Texan for an aerobatics flight, and the club welcomes two new members while bidding farewell to Bob Critchlow, who is relocating to Florida.
President George Hazelrigg sounds the alarm in a forceful 'Freedom to Fly' editorial, warning that a proposed expansion of the Washington, D.C. Air Defense Identification Zone would place the boundary a mere 0.2 miles from the Front Royal runway—effectively declaring gliders a national-security threat. He urges members to contact their Congressional representatives, arguing that post-9/11 restrictions have already shuttered area airports and that the terrorists 'win if they succeed, and they win if they lose.' The issue also features Piet E. Barber's lengthy, mathematically rigorous dissection of two competing aerotow turn techniques, concluding that the standard 'wings parallel' method is overwhelmingly supported by the soaring literature and that the alternative 'straight towline' technique actually increases drag and reduces climb rate. In lighter fare, Bill Wark takes his 84-year-old mother-in-law Marion Garvey for a 30-minute ride over the Shenandoah Valley, and veteran pilot Bob Collier recounts his routine hayfield out-landing that sent Warren County deputies and a State Trooper scrambling. The newsletter also records Eric Litt's CPL(G) rating, Bob Gould's solo, Bill Vickland's third-place finish at the 1-26 Championships in Moriarty, New Mexico, a new zero-balance payment policy from the Board, and Joe Parrish's rejoining of the club from Boston.
This September 2005 issue of *Skylines* is anchored by Dave Weaver's gripping account of the 15-Meter National Soaring Championship at Uvalde, Texas, where a routine cross-country task turned into a survival ordeal. Running low on altitude over some of the most desolate terrain in the contest area, Weaver was forced to land on an unmarked ranch road, where his ASW-27b ground-looped into a barbed-wire fence, shearing off control surfaces and snapping the boom. What followed was a long vigil among seven-foot thorn bushes and a pack of large dogs, a cell-phone relay to his crew chief Byron, and a 2230-hour rescue by two US Border Patrol agents who later revealed he had landed on a primary smuggling route north of the border. The issue also carries Kit Carson's heartfelt resignation from the club after 33 years of soaring, a detailed technical walkthrough of the Tost tow-reel system by George Hazelrigg, Ron Hansen's pointed dispatch from a German gliderport about an airport that refused to send its rescue truck to a burning tractor, and the announcement of the Warrenton-Fauquier Grand Opening Fly-In on the new 5,000-foot runway 14/32.
Judah Milgram's vivid dispatch from the International Vintage Glider Meet at Harris Hill puts readers on the flight line alongside a Sisu that nearly won the 1963 World Gliding Championships in Argentina, a Morelli M-200 two-seater, a Bowlus Baby, a Kirby Kite, and a beautifully restored Frankfort glider—all of them flying, not museum pieces. The issue also carries the invitation to the October 8 dedication of Mount Washington, New Hampshire as the 14th National Landmark of Soaring, honoring Lewin Barringer's pioneering 1938 wave flight. Elsewhere, Chief Tow Pilot Dick Otis lays out the twelve-step gauntlet for minting a new Pawnee tow pilot, President George Hazelrigg wrestles with a $20,000 engine-overhaul decision and a tangle of hangar-fee restructuring, and a letter from the Cape Gliding Club in Worcester, South Africa reminds readers that the soaring community stretches across oceans. A spirited exchange with Rusty Lowry at St. Mary's, Virginia, reveals a small but thriving glider operation on the Chesapeake, while the editor's 'Copy That' column rounds out the issue with a square-dance plug, Katrina volunteer calls, and congratulations to the Freytag family on the arrival of baby Henry Christopher James.
This November 2005 issue of Skylines is anchored by a heartfelt tribute to Captain George C. Watkins, U.S. Navy (ret.), the three-war fighter and experimental test pilot who became a fixture at Warrenton Soaring Center and a champion of glider aerobatics in his Fox glider. Fellow pilots recall towing him to 4,000 feet only to watch him roll his Kilo Serria onto its back in mid-air, and a former NAS Patuxent River operations officer shares the story of how the handsome young officer earned his nickname. The issue also reports the Warren County Airport Commission's successful campaign to eliminate the Based-Aircraft Fee and the club's pending recovery of Hangar 5 for five additional trailers. President George Hazelrigg, stepping down after four years, urges members to volunteer for the January board elections. The Soaring Safety Foundation's new 'First Flight' program—requiring every pilot's first flight of 2006 to be with a CFI-G—receives broad endorsement from SSA leadership. In a lighter note, a CBS 60 Minutes crew filmed a 'Mystery Man' glider check-out at Seminole-Lake Gliderport that turned out to be astronaut Neil Armstrong, a competitive glider pilot in the 1960s, for a television special airing November 6. The issue closes with details of the club's December 17 holiday party at the Canary Cottage B&B in Clifton, Virginia, and news of the 14th National Landmark of Soaring dedication at Mount Washington, New Hampshire.
The December 2005 issue closes out the flying season with a blend of celebration, caution, and remembrance. President George Hazelrigg wraps up a successful year at Front Royal, Virginia, celebrating the elimination of the Based-Aircraft Fee and a $3,000 refund, while laying out plans for the Pawnee's engine and calling on members to volunteer for the Board of Directors. The issue's most gripping piece is a first-person accident report from SSA Region XII Director Jim Skydell, who recounts how a single misgrabbed handle—retracting the landing gear instead of deploying spoilers—turned a routine high-drag approach at Cal City into a 70-knot impact that shattered his DG-300 and left him with a fractured lumbar vertebra. A deeply personal tribute from Captain Richard Otis honors his late father, Commander Gordon Otis (USN, Ret.), a WWII antisubmarine pilot, Navy Test Pilot School graduate, and lifelong flight instructor who passed in November 2005. The issue also carries SSA news on the new D.C. ADIZ training requirement, word that Apollo 8 Lunar Module Pilot William Anders will headline the 2006 SSA convention in Arlington, Texas, and details for the club's holiday party at the Warks' Canary Cottage in Clifton, Virginia.