[LASS Soaring] A good day soaring....of course I missed it.

[Brian Kopke]

So I was working in Borden, IN yesterday and decided to check out the
community park while I ate my lunch.  I have passed by this park prolly 100+
times in the last 10 years but I never stopped to see if it was suitable for
soaring.  Well the weather wasn't perfect for flying, windy and trying to
rain, but I wasn't looking at the conditions at first.  When I pulled in I
took a quick look around and deemed it possible to fly there.  The park is
in a valley (Borden Valley off of hwy 60) and runs roughly E to W and has
basketball courts, several ball diamonds, playground, a field large enough
for soccer/hand launch and every bit of it is FLAT.  Right next to the
access road is a large farm field of at least 15 acres and more farmland
beyond some railroad tracks.  All of this is surrounded by "knobs" of
various sizes.  Here is a better picture than I can paint:

http://mapper.acme.com/?ll=38.46187,-85.93184&z=17&t=S&marker0=38.46667%2C-85.94833%2CBorden%20IN

The soccer/hand launch field is in the center of the picture.  I parked in
the small lot between it and the basketball courts, facing the soccer
field.  As I was sitting there I started subconsciously looking around for
signs of lift, a little habit I have gotten into...wonder why?  I noticed
some dry leaves doing a little dance across the soccer field, lift maybe?
Beyond the field was a flagpole with old glory POINTING STRAIGHT DOWN.
Hmmm.  This went on for about 10 minutes then all of a sudden the flag jumps
up and points to the left in a stiff breeze.  I looked downwind and noticed
two vultures floundering around above the hills beyond the farm fields.  A
minute or two later and they both started circling and rising fast.  Yeah it
was lift.  I watched them for a while, one went right and kept climbing, one
went left, didn't do so well, then went right and started catching up.
Pretty soon the one on top was disappearing into the cloud base.  They both
bailed down the valley after getting a nice ride.  I looked back to the flag
and sure enough it was pointing down again.  Then the leaves started to
dance across the field.....and so on.  All in all this took about 18-20
minutes.  Unfortunately I was out of time to watch it all happen again.
While I was pulling out the flag was pointing left again and I saw a hawk
come tearing in to the lift and start circling, getting some free altitude.
All the while I was cursing myself for not having the Photon repaired and
ready and vowing "this won't happen again".   Pretty likely it will though.

Brian
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