Weather Question

Man, this group is dull! Do you think we could get some discussion going? After 20 years of hanging under hot air bags I've come up with some rules of thumb for go or no go decisions. Some of them are obvious; such as, once the afternoon winds start gusting above 17 kts., cancel, it almost never calms down enough for the afternoon flight. Other theories I have seem to work but I don't know why. Such as; say you have a big high pressure and the winds are very light. You're worried about getting stuck on that PM flight. I' ve noticed that if it is hazy the wind never seems to die off totally. Why? I don't know! I realize that many weather conditions are site specific, ( I'm in PA), but I wondered if anyone had a meteorological reason for the supposed haze/wind correlation or maybe other phenomena that we might find edifying. Thanks.

Walt & Kathie

You are right about the 17 kts and around here sometimes the wind doesn't die down till after sundown or not at all. I live in an area where in summer we have lifted off as late as 9:30 pm and still easily get a flight in. It is nice when you don't have to rush to plan an evening flight and crew has had time to get off work, hit the feedbag and still relax before meeting at the launch site. I haven't noticed the haze being associated with wind so much but that could be more to do with location. Hazy around here is usually calm wind conditions.

Went for a Winter flight yesterday Nov 29. Four inches of snow on the ground. Strange wind as it was nil at ground about 2 kts from s.w. at 300 ft. 2kts from n.w. at 600ft. 3kts from n.e. at 1100 ft. All I needed was something from s.e. and I could have flown in circles.

We do need more discussions going on this group so get with it. Marvin Schultz

Marvin,

Where's here? Please.

Your winds sound interesting. and especially being able to fly that late. Where I am evening flights are impossible. Apart from the occasional tether. I'm in Brisbane, Australia. I thought that it was very civilised to do some evening flights whilst passing through Seattle in September.

Cheers, Campbell

Marvin,

We made two flights here in Maryland on the 29th, but they were anything but winter flights. AM conditions saw temps in the 40's, but quickly warmed to the 60's by the time we landed. The PM flight saw everyone in short sleeve shirts, as the temp. was in the mid 70's. By the time we drank our post flight Champagne, it was back in the low 50's. Pretty strange for a month from Christmas, but I guess I won't complain.

Soft Langings,

Randy Danneman Fantasy Flights Silver Spring, Maryland

I was hoping by not saying where I live might get some more posts on this group. It worked. I live in Grande Prairie Alberta Canada. It is about 300 miles north of Edmonton and in mid summer we only get about 4 hours of night and that is sometimes not real dark. I have golfed in High Level( about 300 miles north of us) at close to midnight. Summers are great for ballooning and if the wind stays down 8:00 PM liftoffs are common. The terrain is rolling Prairie with lots of landing spots, very few PZs and mostly decent landowners. Good Flying and Soft Landings

Thanks Marvin,

I did spend a few days in Calgary during my trip, but that was when the weather went rotten, I was assurred that this was the first rain and cold in over a month but it was enough to stop me from looking for balloonists. On my last evening there I did see 3 balloons over the west of north/west of the city though. But by then I was starting to prepare tro leave. Maybe another time.

Campbell