We have two powerful tow planes, so whether I liked it or not I had to persuade my "gliding soul" to make concessions in favour of powered flying. The versatility of the staff is what makes a centre strong.
Everyday life in May
We have two powerful tow planes, so whether I liked it or not I had to persuade my „gliding soul” to make concessions in favour of powered flying. The versatility of the staff is what makes a centre strong. Depending on the needs, we swap between tow planes and gliders while training students or flying scenic flights, where fulfilled dreams show up as flushed cheeks on the faces of delighted passengers.
Contrary to popular opinion, after a break of more than a decade from flying the type, the Wilga greeted me like a long-awaited friend, and once my feet were on the rudder pedals she „wagged” the rudder on her tail. Perhaps the sparks in my eyes and the adoration written on my face, mixed with respect, meant that from the very first moments we were as one. Old habits and memories came back from the days when Wilgas ruled the Polish sky.
It was a little different with the Maule. Even though it is a much easier aircraft to fly, it took a bit longer for us to warm to each other. I was surprised by an episode when, approaching to land at a slightly higher speed, I tried to touch down while the slender airframe floated on and on a few dozen centimetres above the ground with no intention of landing. Seeing the end of the runway approaching, I added power and went around, and on the next circuit I humbly set the book figures and put the aircraft down on the ground without any trouble.
These excellent tow planes provide safety for our gliding operations, and safety is the foundation of aviation – it defines the strength of a centre and the trust placed in its staff.
Aerotows
In Mirosławice we focused on gliding with aerotow launches. This was connected with the length of the runways, but also with the traffic conditions at this welcoming airfield.
Gliding centres work best when their staff are trained across the board. Faced with such plans, I had to bend my gliding preferences a little and return to powered flying. I had not flown the PZL-104 Wilga for more than a decade, but earlier I had been able to fly as many as 50 tows in a single day on the type – that was at the World Vintage Glider Rally in Gliwice. So when, slightly nervous, I climbed back into the cockpit, the old skills returned in an instant.
A safety policy is one of the most important documents of any aviation centre. It contains procedures for dealing with occurrences, but above all preventive measures that keep the probability of such events acceptably low. This introduction explains our decision to use two „powerful” tow planes, which significantly shorten the time a towed glider spends close to the ground.
The first one – because it is iconic – is the PZL-104 Wilga. This flying dragonfly is still the best Polish multi-purpose aircraft design, also used for towing gliders. It is a short take-off and landing aircraft with excellent visibility from the cockpit and tolerance for the not-quite-coordinated „efforts” of a student pilot on tow. Historically, our pilots flying Wilgas at international precision flying competitions swept all the places on the podium. This beautiful aircraft demands precise flying, and landing in particular, because of its tailwheel. The very act of rolling the Wilga out for flying stirs up considerable emotion and undisguised envy among the pilots at Mirosławice.
The second aircraft is the American Maule M7-235. It is a superbly equipped example with a nosewheel, which tows gliders to 500 m in just 5 minutes.
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text: Leszek Wlazło
editing: Łukasz Machowczyk