NCR Club Launch - January 2006

Saturday January 7th, 2006

Launch Summary

Happy New Launch Year! Regularly scheduled club launch. 25 different flyers put up a total of 68 flights. Three L1 certifications for Tripoli members (Eric Parsons, Robert Hawley, Mike Tangora) and one NAR L1 certification for Bruce Schaefer. Four LCO's for the day - Jon Skuba pushed the button 25 times, Ed Dawson with Bryan's help launched 19, Warren Mussleman lofted 16 and Joe Hinton boosted 8. Jon Skuba had the most flights for the day with 10. Apart from the four successful cert flights, most notable launches included four beautiful boosts by Micheal Geck, including his scratch built Pink and Yellow Crayons, Jon Skuba's scratch built Brute, Mike Crawford's clustered Tres, Bill Heath's Space Ship One and the unfortunate demise of Steve Marshall's Rocky S, flown on a K550, the largest motor of the day. Motor class break down as follows: A's - 3, B's -8, C's 16, D's-6, E's-7, F's-4, G's-5, H's-11, I's-7, J's-0, K's-1. Clustered flights are counted in the largest motor included. Thanks to Bill Heath for towing the equipment trailer to and fro.

Weather Conditions

Absolutely stunning weather for January. The range opened at 9 AM with Greeley/Weld County Airport reporting calm winds and clear to partly cloudy skies with a cloud layer at 12,000' - the waiver limit. Early hours warmed quickly to a probable high of 60 degrees before the temperatures began to decline and winds increased slightly thru the morning to reach brisk gusts of 10 to 12 mph before we closed the range at 3 PM, as planned. Winds were generally from the westnorthwest and helped keep the sky clear to partly cloudy all day.