Triple X free flight festival & Homegrown

No it’s not as dodgy as it sounds! Mark Leavesly of Leavesly Aviation is currently organising what is sure to be a huge festival down near the Long Mynd. The event will be on the 20, 21, 22 of June and will have ballon drops, acro displays, stalls, model aircraft, ground handling seminars, beer tent, live band food etc etc. Raul Rodriguez from Niviuk and world no.1 acro pilot will be attending and all event profits will go to charity.

More info: http://www.paraglidingforum.com/viewtopic.php?t=15361

Also, the homegrown festival will now be on the 12,13,14 September. Sure to be a hit again after it’s success last year.

More info: http://www.homegrownfestival.com/

Two dates you must add to your diary!

Helicopter Rescue

On the programme Helicopter Heroes on Monday night, there was a piece about a hang-glider who crashed at Wether Fell. Both in the programme and as said by people there at the time, pilots of both hang-gliders and paragliders continued to soar the hill whilst the helicopter was on its way and when it was trying to land to assist the casualty.

This is obviously extremely dangerous for all parties involved and has made both the sport and the club look very bad, just the sort of publicity we don’t need.

The correct proceedure for when a helicopter is on it’s way to an incident at a flyable hill, is to land immediately.

The signs to show others that a heli is on the way and to assist the heli locate the incident, is to create a large “H” visible on the ground made of 3 paragliders weighed down so as not to blow away by the heli’s downwash.

Also use big ears to get down quicker and warn others in the air, of the heli on it’s way.

Use radios where available.