Staying up in the air

Many people think that gliders are like toy aeroplanes. You know, you just throw them into the air and they wobble about for a minute or so and then come down to earth twenty yards from where they were ‘thrown’, without a whimper. Kids and their dads have been doing it for years, making their aircraft out of A4 size pieces of cartridge paper, folded like Japanese origami and often decorated with RAF roundels, drawn with a biro! Not the most illustrious introduction to flying!

Real gliders are somewhat different! For one thing, they are very carefully designed pieces of equipment, incorporating the lightest possible weight, the most superior aerodynamics and the most sensitive instruments. These are not folded pieces of paper, these a (very) real aircraft and they perform superbly well, especially in the hands of an experienced flyer and in the right weather conditions.

I was no great pilot and my glider wasn’t one of these high performance glass ships, built to fly at a hundred miles an hour, but even I kept my plane in the air for more than five and a half hours on several occasions. In fact, one of the tests every glider pilot has to pass, in order to become a fully qualified pilot, is to remain airborne for at least five hours! It ain‘t easy, I can tell you!

In order to stay up for a long period of time, several basic requirements have to be met. For a start your plane needs to be in good nick, with everything functioning properly, especially the recording equipment on board, the stuff you use at the end of your day to prove that you’ve actually done what you’re claiming to have done. (Some people do try to cheat!)

Next, you need a day with decent weather and a forecast that makes you fairly certain it’s not going to change, after you’ve accomplished four hours and fifty five minutes in the air! That can be very annoying, partly because it means you have to start all over again some other day – you can’t just add on the last five minutes at the next weekend’s flying!

One of the most important things to attend to, immediately prior to starting your attempt, is to make certain your bladder is as empty as you can make it, because five hours is a very long time if you have a well filled bladder and nowhere to empty it. If the most unfortunate happens, you have three options, first and most satisfactory, you can make sure you’re flying in a plane with a “pee-tube”, a wonderful little device that permits you to do the necessary and then deposits it into the air outside, where it starts falling to earth but unfailingly, (and thankfully), evaporates long before it gets there!

Second, you “grin and bear it” and either manage to last until you complete the flight or failing that you wet yourself and sit, uncomfortably warm and wet until landing time arrives. Holding it in can be dangerous and result in a period in hospital, not considered worth it by most pilots.

Third, you give up the attempted record and land back at the airfield – an ignominious ending to the flight that can draw much derision from fellow pilots!

I was fortunate enough to be in the ‘grin and bear it’ brigade, and got away with it on my long flights, something I’d hate to try now, with a bladder that is undoubtedly nearing the end of its useful workinglife!