Cu Nim Gliding Club

Congratulations to @sahil.kale1 on his first solo on type (ASW-19) on Wednesday the 28th, and also completing his FAI Bronze Badge with his second 2h duration flight!

Kaleb and Josh have been great additions to the club (and dad Bart too)! Thanks to CTV Calgary for coming out to the field on the 23rd to share their special solo story. Flying gliders is a tremendously rewarding activity, and going solo is a significant milestone irrespective of age or relationship to siblings.... This is a great reflection on the entire Cu Nim club, and an opportunity we wish all of our fantastic students had the chance to share!

After our ultra marathon Annual General Meeting on Saturday, some members still hadn't had enough of the club and were out on Sunday. An E/W windrow of snow and a strong wind from the south meant we were limited to a few tow pilot checkouts, but did rig our @alexander.schleicher_gmbh ASK-21B and moved some trailers around, plus the trial of a "kiosk" for our clubhouse to cycle between weather, OLC, OGN and others. Record early start, and record early interest.

It's starting to look and feel like we should be soaring soon... : @matt_cocrane

Congratulations to Kaleb and Josh! Our 14 year old, identical twin student pilots who completed their first solo flights in our ASK-21B on Saturday, April 17th. Photo 1: Proud/relieved parents watch Kaleb retrieve brother Josh after his first flight. Photo 2: Sticking with what's been working, learning through the COVID pandemic, Josh retained his mask for his first solo flight. ... Photo 3: With wind shifting toward the end of the day, Kaleb's first solo launched on RWY32, but the student pilot identified RWY07 as the safer option for landing and executed it skillfully. Not only did club President Ben perform the solo flight test, simulated rope break and monitor the first flights, he also captured these great shots of a special day!

Cu Nim objective oriented students in the news! Thanks for sharing our story CTV News!

Kaleb Joshua It's the middle of winter and the flight request board highlights a good news story of 2020 and what we expect to be a great news story of 2021.... Is this a residual ASK-21 flight request from last season, or a pending request for this season? Or both... These two members are twins, who but for some December snow and enhanced COVID restrictions in Alberta may have completed their first solos on their 14th birthday. We look forward to the resumption of flying and the opportunity to build on their "learn to fly" 2020 success and introduce "learn to soar". Some of the many good things to come!

Ben and Patrick were out to the club today to start the tinkering toward the 2021 season. Through the activity they recovered the last two gliders requiring their annual inspections to our mechanic. It's been a goal over the last few seasons to move all of the annual inspections to the non-flying season - mission accomplished. We also had a visitor - an Alberta general aviation pilot doing some approach and gos.... Lovely day for it all!

If you're interested in the incredible sport of soaring - in Southern Alberta speficially - join us for our 2nd annual 'Introduction to Gliding' webinar series. Register for the course at: http://cunim.org/introduction-to-soaring/

It's official, we've caught a @condorsoaring fever! The Southern Alberta scenery is now available through popular outlets featuring mountains (launch from Cowley for best access) and great thermal conditions - just like real life. Thanks to Nick B of MSC and soaringtools.org for the landscape, we're already having lots of fun with it.... More to come on tasks you can join as we define a regular schedule, but go queue up the scenery - it's a beauty!

Unable to meet for our annual banquet, we resorted to using 'Turnpoints' to recognize some outstanding contributions and achievements through a unique year with unique challenges. You might agree that we made the most of the year we all shared!

Greta and Gretchen were working together this weekend to clear our runway for self launch (solo due to enhanced COVID) wave operations. Do you love anything enough to plow a 4000'x200' runway (plus apron/taxiway)? If not, have you tried wave soaring?

Tell me more about gliding...

Our most recent edition of 'Turnpoints' features the arrival of a new (to us) glider, a soaring flight with a duration longer than the length of day, and implications of enhanced COVID restrictions on two of our brightest stars - 'the twins'. Always something neat happening at Cu Nim!

More toys away for the winter, thanks to a few members out to enjoy the sun and socially distant story telling. We de-rigged our ASK-21B, and packed a number of club and private gliders in our hangar.

Chester cleared the field on Wednesday and appears to have broken a Canadian record on Friday in his Schempp-Hirth Arcus M! 300km Open Out & Return record, previously 124.8km/h in Canada, 191.3 by a Canadian. Both expected to be updated to ~208km/h! Congrats Chester! Looking forward to more great flights! ... The overall flight was 1004km @ 173.5km/h. https://skylines.aero/flights/127623

We love The Thermal Podcast, and The Thermal Podcast at least likes us! Episode 18 features a shoutout from author Bernard Eckey for legendary member of Cu Nim, Tony Burton, for Tony's contributions to 'Advanced Soaring Made Easy' on the release of the final version, 4.1. Some call the 'Soaring Bible'... Even more exciting is that Cu Nim is featured on the segment 'Gliding Club Confidential'. If you didn't know how unique we were before, don't miss this opportunity to find o...ut! Listen, like and share!

Have a look back at the 2020 soaring season in Alberta, including milestones for our members and colleagues! ASCent is compiled by Cu Nim member and Canadian soaring legend, Tony Burton.

The longest (duration) flight in the world on November 4th was a 608km flight at a blistering 168km/h. Alberta vs Nambia... surf's up!

Congrats to Chester and Patrick, their flight yesterday may (TBC) set the first 200+km/h SAC - ACVV speed record with an otherwise incredible flight!

Incredible performance by Chester and Patrick in a Schempp-Hirth Arcus M today. Can you believe an average sped of 212km/h over 971km in the Chinook wave? Dig into the flight and find a 156km leg with an average speed above 300km/h! 6th best flight in the world, and possibly another new Canadian record. Congrats fellas! https://skylines.aero/flights/127769

Putting a toy away... Had to pull the Pawnee & ASK-21B out to pack our PW-5 for the winter. The K21 came back into the hangar with a bottle of O2... just in case.

Member Marc took his son Alex for a glider flight this summer, and Alex put together a montage of the flight. A great gift to share!