KRONFELD ON GLIDING AND SOARING.pdf - Lakes Gliding Club

THE LEAN YEARS 77
to be carried out. A new feature of this Rossitten meeting
was the successful night flying of Schulz, Martens, and the
Darmstadt group.
The French meeting in Vauville, which took place almost
simultaneously with the Rhon competitions, afforded a
splendid proof of the enthusiasm and skill of the French
and Belgian devotees of the new sport. That year they were
favoured with excellent weather. The Belgians broke
Schulz's record of the previous year twice, Major Massaux
remaining in the air for ten hours and nineteen minutes, and
Lieutenant Demblon for ten hours. The Frenchman
Auger climbed before a thunderstorm to a height of two
thousand three hundred and seventy-six feet, but his flight
could not be recognized as a record because he had not
complied exactly with the rules governing the registration
of records. It was, nevertheless, a splendid feat. At that
time, however, flyers had no clear knowledge how they
might best utilize the energies of the thunderstorm, and
several years were to elapse before they acquired it.
On the whole that year's French meeting was most
successful, although it was somewhat clouded by the fatal
accident to the Belgian pilot, Simonet.
The German flyers were invited to an autumn meeting
in the Crimea and warmly welcomed the opportunity to
show what they could do, the more so as their home results
for the year had been so mediocre.
The Russians who were with us in the Rhon had much
to say about their splendid flying region, and we found that
their enthusiasm was fully justified. Excellent upwind was
supplied by a mountain ridge three miles in length, with
slopes of from five hundred to six hundred and fifty feet
high. At his first attempt Schulz flew five hours and
fifty-one minutes, but thenext day the Russian, Jakobtschuk,
achieved a flight of nine hours and a half. This spurred
on " Uncle Ferdinand," who arrived at the starting place
early in the morning of the following day armed with three
sandwiches, a pocket lamp and his native obstinacy, and
brought off a characteristic flight of twelve hours six
minutes twenty-five seconds, of which over an hour was
flown after night. In the course of this flight he also