Marlborough Gliding Club

Phone 0800 GLIDING

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LOCATION

Marlborough Gliding Club flies every Sunday (weather permitting) at Omaka and other times as arranged.

Omaka is to the southwestern edge of Blenheim. From the middle of Blenheim head south and when you come to Alabama Road, head west (right) until you come to Aerodrome road on the outskirts of town. Go down Aerodrome road and you will be at Omaka (top left in the diagram) .

At the aerodrome go to the club caravan which will be at any of the arrow points depending on the wind direction.

PLEASE KEEP TO THE PERIMETER OF THE AERODROME AND DO NOT CROSS THE VECTORS IF AN AIRCRAFT IS ON FINALS.

Before crossing to the 01 vector location please check at the main hanger (the big green roofed one with “BP” on it.) There is a duty pilot at the caravan who organises the flights, a duty instructor to teach you and a tow pilot who is the man you have to follow.

So you want to learn to soar?

Now that you have had a taste of flying like a bird, here is you chance to learn for yourself the art of soaring.

Becoming a glider pilot is a two stage operation: firstly to go solo and then going on to become a qualified glider pilot. From here you go onto cross country flying and exploring the sky in silent flight.

Going solo involves a well defined syllabus (as per the Gliding New Zealand curriculum) with a series of goals that cover flying skills and the knowledge of important aeronautical principles like What makes a plane fly? Safety is a major emphasis in terms of skill and knowledge.

Once you have gone solo you progress onto the Qualified Glider Pilot certificate which is basically your glider pilot’s license. This requires a similar series of steps through a defined cirriculum aimed at making you competent enough to land out if you have to, cope with different situations and some basics of the skills required to keep you up in the air. Thus your solo course teaches how to fly and get it back down on terra firma safely while the QGP teaches you how to stay up in the sky soaring like a bird. After this, the sky is the limit.

Time:

The instruction to going solo involves a number of flights focused initially on piloting the aircraft in the sky and then circuits, landings, aerotows and emergency procedures. Thus your flying is spent going up and down in the glider learning how to take off and land., rather than learning how to thermal or ridge soar. Ideal conditions for this is therefore in still air at the times when more advanced pilots sit on the ground gossiping and waiting for good soaring conditions. As you get better though you begin to search for the lift, the invisible elevator of thermals. and ridge lift.

If you are keen to proceed on and learn the beauty of soaring, contact our chief flying instructor or any of the other instructors or perhaps turn up any sunday and talk about gliding instruction.

CFI Mike Dekker Phone 5776858

Costs: an average 8 minute tow to 2000ft costs approx. $32 and the Blanik training glider costs 60 cent per minute. Most of the cost of going solo is in tow fees: Beginner pilots generally take from 30-40 flights to go solo. This is very variable depending on your enthusiasm and ability levels. Previous flying experience greatly helps, and computer flight simulators and model planes are good for starters. Gliding is the cheapest way to learn to fly an aircraft.

SAFETY:

DO NOT drive across the airfield. Always stay to the perimeter and do not cross the threshold (start) of a landing vector if an aircraft is coming in to land (on finals).

Gliding is the safest airsport according to the recent CAA Vector magazine