2014 New Years Day Fly-in
Tom Hintz - 01/02/2014
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The weather cooperated for the almost spontaneous New Years Day Club event and around 25 pilots came out and had a good time.
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A first annual RC Wingers event?
When I flew RC over 25 years ago in Wisconsin several of us made a commitment to fly on New Year's Day no matter what. In Wisconsin the "no matter what" part can be downright dangerous. Twice we flew after 20+ inch snow storms on New Year's Eve, on several New Year's Days the temperatures stayed well below zero. We each actually got a few flights in once when temperatures hovered around minus 20-degrees, flying glow-powered planes that needed a couple squirts of alcohol to get started.
After living in North Carolina for nearly 20 years and re starting RC flying about 9 months ago I realized that there is very little to prevent RC Wingers members from having some fun on New Year's Day. I posted a sort of challenge on our Facebook page and members immediately started getting behind the idea.
New Year's Day 2014 tuned out to be nice with light winds and temperatures hovering in the 50';s. As you can see in the video we had a great turnout for the first of what I hope will be an annual event for the RC Wingers club. Around 25 pilots flew the full range of RC planes and helicopters. We even had a couple new members come out and get some flights in.
Unfortunately there was a fairly serious crash early on but that turned out to be the only real damage sustained during the day. A few new planes took their maiden flights and more than a few pilots shook off the rust of not flying for several weeks or longer. Coop and Jeff grilled hotdogs so we had nice (and free) lunch for everyone at the field. All in all, a great day of flying.
Video Report |
I am hopeful that this will be the first of many New Year's Day fly in's for the RC Wingers club. We are fortunate to live in a mild climate and have a great flying facility that we can access all year round. Maybe for 2015 we will make this an official RC Wingers event and invite pilots from other clubs in the area. Stay tuned.