HIGH-ALTITUDE GLIDING

Press, Volume XCI, Issue 27557, 14 January 1955, Page 10

HIGH-ALTITUDE GLIDING

MR WILLS’S RECORD IN DOUBT COLLEAGUE’S FEAT IN CALIFORNIA Flying over Mount Cook on December 29, Mr Philip Wills, the former world gliding champion, who is visiting New Zealand, was reported to have reached an altitude of slightly more than 30,000 feet above sea level. The calibrating of the barograph he carried on this flight, which is now in progress, indicates that his maximum altitude may have beep about 1000 feet lower than had at first been thought. Mr Wills announced this in Christchurch yesterday afternoon, when he learned that a British colleague, Commander H. C. N. Goodhart, R.N., had reached 30,500 feet flying over the Sierra Nevada mountains in California. A report from London said the flight would not be recognised as a British record because it did not exceed by the necessary margin of 5 per cent. Mr Willis’s New Zealand flight. He felt he should make it known that his altitude was probably lower than he had at first thought, in case

Commander Goodhart might not think it worth while laying claim to a record, said Mr Wills. If his altitude over Mount Cook was only about 29,000 feet. Commander Goodhart might

come very close to exceeding his record by the 5. per cent, margin, he said. Depending on the accuracy of his instruments also, it might be a matter of only a few feet either way Mr Wills knows Commander Goodhart well. He described him as “one of our jolly good pilots.” In 1950 he recalled, the commander had been a member of his ground team at the international gliding championships at Sweden. Late last year, a brother of Commander Goodhart’s, LieutenantCommander G. A. J. Goodhart, visited New Zealand and flew in Mr S. H Georgeson’s Weihe sailplane from Harewood. Mr Wills will leave Christchurch today for the North Island, and will sail for England on the Ruahine in about a week’s time. Complicated Air Conditions His prediction that some of the best conditions in the world for high alti? tuue flying existed in the lee of the Southern Alps had been confirmed by his experience in the Mackenzie Country, he said yesterday, but air conditions in the region were extremely complicated and highly unusual. A “meteorologist’s nightmare” was how he described them. Mr Wills, was surprised- at the varying conditions that could be encountered in a comparatively short radius In one locality a north-west wind would be blowing. Five miles away there would be a rainstorm, and a little distance away something else. Up to 1500 feet it could be blowing from one direction, and above that from the opposite direction. This meant that the conditions were difficult to know and difficult to learn about, but there were still great possibilities for high soaring. The day that he had reached nearly 30,000 feet over Mount Cook was “quite an indifferent day.” he said.

He was still going up when he had to come backv and might well have gone a long way further had he been properly clad and had the canopy of the cockpit not started to crack.

Two days later, flying again from Simon’s Hill, the scene of the Canterbury Gliding Club’s training camp, in north-west weather. Mr Wills said he had had the roughest flight of his life. He had landed after an hour and a half without being able to reach “tremendous wave clouds with great height possibilities.”

In the Mackenzie Country Mr Wills was able to watch the operations of the Canterbury Gliding Club. He praised the sensible approach to flying of the club. “They operate the thing properly and fly safely,” he said. “Their organisation is sound.” f