Tekapo

Went to Tekapo last Saturday for Dynamic Soaring. The wind was really strong from 40 - 60mph. A great view from the ridge overlooking Lake Tekapo and up to the Southern Alps.

With strong wind conditions launching was differcult; here's Alex launching Andrew's DSX - plenty of rocks and not much grass about.

And this is what the backside of the slope looked like. Pretty steep.

Andrew's DSX looked good in the air, but it was getting a lot of buffeting from the turbulent shear, and eventually it succumbed and the elevator blew off creating a massive crash that resulted in this pile of bits. $4,000 plane is no more :-(

There was no shortage of sad tales for the day, and at the end we had 9 planes in the wreckage pile. DSing is surely the hardest flying to do and the fastest way to write off a plane.