Saturday 8 July 2017

Who's a lucky boy then?

Myself, Rob & Ian started flying to the West of Ditchling Beacon Car park. All was well and the lift was soft but with good thermals pulling through. A few hors passed and Rob went off home and myself and Ian were enjoying the challenging conditions with a light a variable wind with broken thermals. Ian was flying his Shadow and I was flying my Maxa 4 with its new F3J thermal fuselage.
The Maxa had been performing really well and climbed away a few times from below the hilltop height. This time I was a way out from the hill and coming back low. I made sure I kept the speed on but I was losing the model from view as the hill dropped away sharply below my feet and then there is a flat section where the roman road is then the next steep bowl. I moved forward hoping to get a better view but the steep hill and road where getting in the way as the model was well down the slope at this stage. I started to walk down the slope but began to pick up speed and ended up face first in stinging nettles and my face hitting the upward slope hard. It could have only been about 15 - 20 seconds but the Maxa had vanished. Ian landed his shadow and I slid down the steep bowl on my bum and then across to where I could see the model in a tree.
I scrambled back to the top of the hill while having an asthma attack and having burning / stinging to my arms, tummy and face from the stinging nettles.
Ian said take a rest and don't die on the hill side. We wandered back to the cars when I then realised I had lost my very expensive vary-focal glasses. Off we plod to the human crash site partly down the slope where Ian luckily found my misshapen glasses. (Lucky point No 1).
We then made our way down to the main Ditchling Beacon road (about a 3rd of the way down) and siting in the top of a massive tree was a very in tact Maxa 4 (Lucky No,2).
 
What to do?
I know lets try and find a tree surgeon with a man up lifter. After a few phone calls we found a guy (Allan) with a 20 metre cherry picker. 'Be with you in half an hour mate' (Lucky No.3).
He turns up with a huge wagon with a cherry picker on the back. Me and Ian have to do a bit of traffic management until Allan decides the safest option is to stop all the traffic. 'You jump in the cage'. That's me ...... A big gulp and up I went. Don't look down fool.
 
I grabbed the model and was soon back on the ground but with massive queues of traffic in both directions. (Lucky No,4)
Allan and Ian were complete hero's and I wouldn't have been to deal with it all without Ian's help and calm control.
It cost me £100 but the model was virtually undamaged and my glasses where a bit bent but Ian had found them.
All in all I was just very lucky bloke other than the cuts, bruises and a top half full of stings from the nettles.

5 comments:

  1. Bloody hell Paul, I'm glad (and sorry) I went home a bit early. I missed all the fun and excitement.... glad it all worked out well in the end..

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  2. What an epic! Bet you wished you'd flown with the electric fus! Glad no harm to man nor machine. Those tough days are usually the ones where you learn the most so hope it doesn't dampen your spirits. Just boarding to Dar es Salaam. Hope my flight doesn't have similar issues!!

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  3. Ps very resourceful to think about calling a tree surgeon. I'd never have thought of that and would probably have broken my neck trying to climb the tree!!

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  4. Wow Paul, what a story! Tenacity ruled the day and I'm impressed with the way you stayed focused on retrieval even in such difficult circumstances. Nice one!

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  5. Glad it all worked out ok and you are ok Paul!

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