205. Chasing the Monster - Gordon Boettger

Hi there, everybody. Welcome to another episode of the CloudBase Mayhem. I have an outrageous story for you today and conversation with Gordon Boker. If you don't know his name, you will. He broke the record recently in a sailplane going farther than anybody ever has. Although you'll hear why it wasn't a world record, the way they count things with declared distances and points and that kind of thing. You'll hear about all that in the show. But I was sent an article sometime in late June about a gentleman who had flown for 17 hours, flew all night with night vision goggles in wave, chasing the big monster in a sailplane with a co-pilot up and down the Sierras.

And I thought I read the article and went home. I got to get this guy on the show. So this is it. We've been trying to get together for the last couple of months. Finally did. Had an outrageous talk and a lot of fun with this. Gordon is a commercial pilot for FedEx, flies all over the world. He is awesome to follow on Instagram. Check him out. It's G-R-B-O-E-T-T-G-E-R, Boker. He's been flying his whole life. Came out of the Navy. He's been flying sailplanes since he was a kid. And these days, just almost. He exclusively chases wave. He chases the monster in the Sierras. So we eventually, we talk about a lot of flying and his history and photography and a bunch of the stuff that he's really passionate about.

But eventually we get to his amazing flight. Stays up in the air, like I said, 17 hours, flies all night. Does it with night vision goggles. Has a very, very special sailplane. There's only four of these in the world that was really built for exactly this. And he's been doing this kind of mission. So he's way into it. He is wild. We had an outrageous time talking about this. I think I've just said that now three times, but it's the only way to describe it. And one correction is he mentions a few times IGC. Of course, we all know what an IGC file is, but what he was, what he meant in that capacity was, was the FAI. So he's talking about, you know, how to spit records and, and a governing body, but that's all pretty obvious. We were just, we were both.

Yeah.

Was that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that I'm really excited to talk about this insane flight you did. This came, I don't remember how this came over my, flew over my desk one day in the last couple of months. I know this was June 19th when you did it, but I read this, the article and went, my God, I got to talk to this guy. And so we will, we will get there, but let's, let's, let's just tease our listeners here a little bit and get into, I'd love to hear more about your, your history.

I, you know, I know you fly big jets for FedEx. You've been doing that for a long time. You mentioned you were in the Navy to begin with, but how did you get to this point where you can fly the sailplanes so well? Let's, and take your time, but let's, let's get, let's get us up to speed.

Well, it all, it all kind of started as, as a kid. You know, my dad, he, he and my mother immigrated from, from Germany and back in the late mid sixties, he was in the German air force out there. So he was always, I got a very family oriented. Or a aviation oriented family. So my, my father got me into it. He used to throw me in the backseat of these gliders down in the Mojave desert when I was a kid. And, and I kind of took to it and my mom worked for flying tigers at the time. And I used to be able to do some non-rev flights sometimes in the cockpit. And I, you know, I've always thought this is a pretty cool, pretty cool lifestyle. These guys are living all, you know, flying all over the world and just having a good time, making decent money, a lot of time off. And I go, I think this is something I might want to do. So, you know, my dad entered. Introduced me to soaring at the age of 13.

And I took to that down in Southern California. There was actually a place down in Los Alamitos at the military base that had a soaring program. So I got involved with that at age 13 and then sold it on my 14th birthday. And then just. Was your dad military? Yeah, he was in the German air force out there. And then he came out here and got a job in McDonnell Douglas as an engineer with Douglas. But he was a flight instructor. And yeah, I grew up doing a lot of surfing. So that was kind of my life. And I knew I had to eventually, you know, do something that's that was going to be a little more serious. But the glider stuff, I just got I just got hooked on. And it was just like in the paragliding world. You just you know, you kind of know what's what's next. And so I sold on my 14th birthday and then started getting into this cross country stuff.

And, you know, Schweitzer 126 glider, which is kind of a low performance, you know, probably that 24 to one glide ratio type glider. But. I started getting into that cross country thing as a kid. And then I started going out to the desert every single weekend. And that was my life. Every weekend to go out to the desert, sleep with my buddies back in the back of this Toyota pickup truck. And we just fly gliders all weekend long and drive back and get back to school Monday morning. So that was my life. And then that helped me actually get into the military and the flying background. I started with power at age 15 and so low on my 16th birthday with the power power planes. But the. The engine stuff didn't didn't intrigue me because it was it was after flying gliders. It's pretty boring, you know, having a motor hanging out there.

So I kind of stuck with the glider stuff and really started stretching my distances and going after these these soaring badges, you know, that soaring society of America has and started acquiring all those and then and then I joined the military. So I joined the Navy, went off to Pensacola flight training, two years of flight training, and then spent six years active duty flying off of the military. So I was a pilot in the Navy, two different aircraft carriers and did my time and punched out of there and got a job with FedEx at age 28. And then I've been doing

that. What were you what were you flying off the carriers? What was your E-2 Hawkeyes? Okay.

That's basically a carrier based AWACS to Rook Rop airplane. So yeah, I did my time there and then, you know, in the Navy. Did you enjoy it? You know, the flying part of the flying stuff on off the boat. It was really challenging. That part was fun, but I just didn't I didn't enjoy life sitting on a, you know, sitting on a big gray thing with 5000 dudes, you know, for six months that that got old. But you know, I mean, it was a stepping stone to get the airlines because they needed that flight time and I didn't have the money to pay for that myself in the civilian world. So I had a great way to get our use the military, you know, it's the you serve your country and you know that all that kind of jazz. But that was good. That was all good and got my experience.

I'm glad I did it. You know, you grow up pretty quickly doing it. And you know, it's funny looking back now you see these kids that are that were my age, you know, 22 years old flying off these boats. You're going like, Oh, these kids are letting these kids fly these airplanes off of carriers, you know, so I'm kind of kind of aging myself. I'm like the old man now. But you know, that's not

all Top Gun. It's not that exciting.

That's right. Yeah, I'm not. I'm not the Tom Cruise looking guy. That's for sure. But you know, it's funny. During the Navy, during my time in the Navy, I was still always, you know, still wanted to really get into the sailplane stuff, the distance stuff. And obviously, you know, with a family and all that, I just didn't have the time to do everything I wanted to do. So the glider stuff was kind of put on hold. And then it we've been up here in the military for 21 or about just about 21 years now. So so once we got back, Was that

immediately post Navy? So you've been there? Yeah. Yeah, I was about two years

after, two years after I got out of the Navy, I bailed out of San Diego. I was living in San Diego. And, you know, I was flying down in Water Springs down in the, you know, hills east of San Diego. And, you know, the soaring is okay, but you can't really get out and do the big stuff like you can here. You know, it's not the big stuff. But once I moved up here, then I started getting really serious about doing doing big wave flights. And that's what, you know, I knew I was always limited distance wise with thermal flights, because we're relying on heating. Yeah. Yeah. And with mountain wave, it's just a whole different, whole different animal, you know, and it's super good here, both thermals and wave.

I mean, was that was the wave flying? I mean, because this is something really beyond the stretch that, you know, hang gliders can touch it. But the really, you know, I we have I flew in wave in the Alps during the 2015 X-Alps. And you know, it's pretty rowdy for us. You know, that's, that's just that's a lot of that's a lot of wind. But was this something that was early on? Was it on your radar from the 14? Or was this something? Yeah, it was. I mean, you know, guys, just in your world, this is what you guys do.

Yeah, I mean, wave is overall wave is very, it's not popular with most, I would say probably 90 % of the this cell plane pilots because they don't want to deal with the elements. They don't want to deal with the winds. They don't want to deal with the cold, the icing, the freezing, and just the turbulence. Yeah. And all the other crazy stuff that goes along with it. I mean, there's a price to pay for these, these distances, you got to be willing to deal with that kind of, you know, to deal with those risks. And I mean, the risks, the risks are there, and everything's kind of heightened. And you got to be on your A game. But I think it can be safely done. But backing up to when it when it all started, I started flying wave at probably age 15 and 16. I mean, when I was 16, I was like, I was, I think 16 or 17.

I went up in the Owens Valley. I was up above the loon pine at 34,000 feet, you know, 16 year old kid.

Wow. No way.

Yeah. Wow. It's pretty wild. These are a lot of

pressure. I talk about the, I mean, we got a long way to come up to where you are now, but even back then, what equipment when you're 16 flying at 34 grand, what do you, what equipment are you using?

Are you

just on bottled oxygen? Yeah, you're just bottled. Paragliding? Okay. Yeah.

I mean, nowadays we have the EDS regulators, but back then you had, you either had a constant flow system or you had a pressure man regulator, you know, the old military type A14 regulator. And at the time I had an A14 regulator and you know, those drain you of O2 as well as you know, the constant flow system. So back then, you know, I'm flying with an A14 regulator, you know, you're not pressurized or heated and, and you know, they had a back in the fifties, they did a big Sierra wave project. And. So, you know, that was kind of a government sponsored type project that they did for a several winters. Like a pre-Perlan

type of thing?

Yeah. So they learned a lot because that was all done at Bishop. So they learned a lot about rotor turbulence, you know, and, and all this other wacky stuff that goes on with wave and, you know, they ended up writing books about it. And so wave has been, you know, it's been something, an area, an area that people touched, I think, but not really seriously gotten into, because like I said, a lot of people don't, like, deal with it. I mean, I'll go to the Minden airport and you'll see 30 gliders tied out in the summertime, the winter time, nothing, you know, they're like, we're done gliders in the box, see in spring and, you know, I'm like, Hey, if the air is going up vertically, use it, you know, as long as you can safely do it and, you know, take advantage of it. And that's, that's, I've always been intrigued with the wave because I think all the records from here on out are going to be in done, are going to be done in wave.

Sure. They

have to be. They've

got to be right? Cause

you just can't, you can't do that. And with the length of day, limited length of day, you haven't done thermals as you guys not. So

When you were 16 flying at 34 grand, are you flying in triple sleeping bag? How are you staying warm? It's not like Back then

we had the moon boots, you know? So yeah, that was that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that

that that that that

that that

that that that that that that that that that that that that that that

find out what the proper gear is. You're learning the hard way. You know, you're coming back and your fingers and feet are about to fall off. And yeah, you go, why am I doing this? But, you know, the canopy is icing up. And the guy said, oh, you got to use alcohol and spray it on the canopy. And so I'm shooting the canopy and the whole thing's icing up. And that didn't do anything. And people say, you know, there's a lot of goofy stuff. But yeah, it was pretty spooky that one day. And that was actually the day after my friend Bob Harris broke the world altitude record. He got up to 49,009 feet, unpressurized. So that was pretty cool. Oh,

unpressurized. Yeah, that

was ballsy. To me, that's like Chuck Yeager type stuff. That's old school. He just did it in a kind of standard glider and went up there and unpressurized. And a friend of mine that I grew up with, the guy I used to go flying with, he was like 19 or 20 at the time. He got up. He got up to a little over 40,000 feet. And he got bent that day. And so he was in the Marine Corps. And the following day, he ends up, you know, we crashed out in the back of his Toyota truck. And so we celebrated because Bob Harris got the world altitude record. My buddy, Howard Foote, he got a little over 40,000 feet. So we wake up in the morning. We're sleeping in sleeping bags in the back of his truck. And he goes, man, I feel like shit. I go, what's going on? He goes, I don't know.

And I go, dude, the waves work. We got to fly. He goes, I can't. He goes, I got to drive back down to El Toro. Station. He drives down to El Toro and barely makes it down there. And he checks in the medical room. Like, what were you doing? I don't like, you know, flew up to 40,000 feet. So they put him in a chamber down in San Diego. And he got bent big time. So he got. Would that have

been hape?

No, he got.

He got

an aerial embolism. So he got, you know, the nitro, you know, the bubbles in the bloodstream.

So he got. Yeah, he got. And he

was diving

in reverse. This is a whole nother story. But at the time, this could be a whole nother podcast type thing. But at the time, he was trying to get into the Marine Corps to fly. He was an enlisted guy. He knew the general of the base, General Bloomer, General Bloomer, was going to help him get in the flight program. Well, about six months after he got bent, he submits his paperwork to get in the flight program. He's got to do this medical thing, eval. And they go, you can't fly. You've had the bends. So he goes back to General Bloomer. Homer says, hey, General, you got to fix this. You're a general, by the way, you know. And the general says, hey, I can't do anything about this. What does he do? About a year later, he steals an A-4 jet out of El Toro. It flies it out over freaking Southern California. Yep.

What? Yeah, lands it back at El Toro and gets, you know, military. It was a Fourth of July weekend. He took off at midnight, dark runway. And he just jumped in a jet. And it was an 0-8-4. It had an internal APU and then started it up and then blasted off and then came back. And he got thrown in the brig and, you know, it ended up in the papers. So there is some Top Gun shit going on. Oh, yeah.

That is

awesome. So anyway, buddy foot, yeah, he got remembered for that. But yeah, so fast forward, you know, when I moved up to Minden, I just got, you know, I go, hey, I got to get into this whole wave thing. And at the time, I was flying an old 1971 Kestrel. Which is probably a, you know, probably 42 to one glide ratio, you know, an old wing. But still, it could do something. And anyway, I had big bottles in that and started doing some big flights in that. And I finally did a 2000 kilometer, several 2000 kilometer flights in that. So that got quite a bit of publicity, you know. You went 2000 K thermally, not wave. No, no, that was in wave. That was in wave, okay.

Yeah. Kestrel. Yeah. So, okay. Wow. You know, I'd say. That's incredible. Yeah. How many

laps? How many times up and down is that?

Well, that was a three turn point. So I got a few records out of that. So that was a three turn point distance record. And I'm not quite sure how you guys have your record categorized, but we can have a three turn point distance record where we have, we can pre-declare three turn points. Yeah. And they have to be at least 10 kilometers apart. So we can go up and down what we call Yo-Yo up and down the Owens Valley. And we have straight out distance records. So I have one, I almost made it to rapid city, South Dakota on, on a downwind flight and wave. So. How far is that?

That was, that was probably seven, roughly 800 statute, maybe. So

you're, so you, and that was declared goal kind of flight. I

declared it, but I didn't reach the goal. The goal was rapid city. I landed. I landed just outside. I

landed just outside

of devil's tower there. The, uh, at that airport. Amazing. So, but what, what, what's happening with all these flights is, you know, I'm going above 18,000 feet. I'm going up in the class airspace. So I have, um, some letter agreements established with, uh, with Oakland salt lake, Denver center and Seattle center to go up high. So what I do is I can

just declare on the day. Do you, you, you let them know the day of or day before. They

want you to. They want you to call the day before. You call us control center supervisors. I am. I'm that idiot with the glider. That's going to try to go up high and get in everyone's way and go down. Are you

flying with farm? What are you flying with? Yeah, I do have

form, but I've got, I'm ADS be out and in with a transponder, you know, but glider glider, it's all, you know, the form stuff is really effective. So, so yeah. So I started getting into this, uh, the wave stuff here and things started cutting, getting bigger and bigger. And then I got a duo jet. I've never flown that glider yet. I've never flown that glider yet. I've never flown that glider yet. I've never flown that glider yet. I've never flown that glider yet. I've never flown that glider yet. I've never flown that glider yet. I've never flown that glider yet. I've never flown that glider yet. I've never flown that glider yet. I've never flown that glider yet. I've never flown that glider yet.

it was equipped with lights i was able i was able to legally fly at night which is which is okay but to do like an overnight flight it's like it's a whole different animal you know and then

talk talk about real real quickly just for for those who you know paragliders of course we we understand the concept of wave but we i i i don't know how much wind you need to create wave and what what are you looking for in the forecast when you're doing these 2000ks and how and how many years ago was that was that

um for the what 2000 when you're doing

starting doing the in the kestrel

yeah that was probably 20 years ago i mean okay i started getting some big flights and what

does it what do you need to what for that to set up and what what is it like launching in that kind of lee and what so

so what we're basically looking for is we're basically looking for you know the key months for for for wave i mean obviously all winter long because any anytime you have a low pressure system that pumps through so i'm looking at kind of the 500 millibar chart which is kind of at the 18 000 foot levels kind of see where the jet jet streams line up with the jet axis and see what kind of flow that that system that's bringing us and and it's for this year it's all going to be prefrontal type waves so we're looking at a southwesterly type flow and so when that flow when that jet stream starts kind of dipping south that's when you know that's when it's like okay you know it starts like it's like the buoy readouts you know it's like oh man the buoys are starting you know it's starting so you gotta you gotta start watching this stuff and then and then nowadays with yeah it's like here we go so several days out i use a um an app called sky site i don't know do you guys use sky site yeah

yeah we use a lot yeah

so yeah yeah matthew's awesome so sky set runs 8 a.m to 8 p.m and and i go matthew you gotta run these models all night for me now because i'm doing these nighttime things he goes on no worries night and you get the thing going all night so i download all the stuff and uh sky it's been super super good and i mean i honestly have to say sky sites probably change soaring and i don't know how it how it has been for for the paragliding world but the accuracy and detail of wave because typically we fly wave if you can use markers you know like rotor clouds or or lenticulars that that's your that's your key but the sky side if we're flying in blue wave you know where there are no cloud markers then you can download all the herd at an hr um models for for all the vertical velocity for

the the day of and then and then have it on your phone and just basically flying that magenta area of lift and it is it is so accurate i'm not saying 100 of the time but it's it's it allows you to fly so much further and i think more aggressively because you can go okay there's a dead zone right here i'm going to jam down because down your mammoth it's it's going off again or leave mining you know so um according to sky i'm going to

point i'm going to point it and we're going to get it we're just going to we're going to fly through this kind of left less oh yeah area fast we're going to punch it we'll get there yeah

because i did these i did a lot of these big flights when i didn't have that and so you're kind of blindly flying down kind of like oh god you know and you're just seeing this snow blowing off the peaks going oh man this is if i have to land and leave which happened to me once and it was that's that's about as close to death i thought i was gonna get i mean it was that was scary i mean i've never seen hold on we gotta hear this one okay

take us through it what happened

well that was in the old casserole so this is before Skysight i i blast out of men and five in the morning and and i get up to 24 000 feet away and uh i'm hauling ass south and everything's good and winds aloft are cranking so i'm running down towards in your south end in sierra and i get a beam um mammoth and mammoth and that whole area gets kind of goofy with wave and there's some a lot of times there's some dead areas

because because of the past because of the low area there yeah we get hammered in that too yeah the terrain is flying that kind of thing yeah and then you're going the train

gets goofy jones valley's spot on it's almost like a no-brainer there down down there but i was heading south and um and i remember looking out and i was at 24 26 000 feet looking at the tops of these you know like mount tom and these big peaks i'm going holy shit it's blowing i mean you can see the snow just blowing like miles off the peaks you know and you know mono lake was just going off you know and just white capped and so i get down south down and come back north and i i'm coming north out of the owens valley and i'm at 28 000 feet near shit i'm like near mount tom and i'm at 28 000 feet and i make a run and i noticed the clouds the lenticulars had pushed way east and it was just it was a different completely different look at sky like two hours later and i went this is strange so i i and it wasn't really marked so i went to where the lift was when i came south i flew that same line come on the

other side of the

north and it was the my very almost head i was like i was probably sinking 2 000 feet a minute i went from 20 000 feet at mount tom here you know south of mammoth to being at lee vining at 3 000 agl and just you know and so hold on you're

now so you're in you're you're too far west you're in the you're in the

dump yeah so that it's what happened that what happened is the winds had so much the jet had pushed south so quickly and i think the winds just got so hellaciously strong there's a point where they're too strong you know what it is it flattened out that wavelength so instead of that big sharp propagation you know right five miles east of the spine of the mountains it was like the the way was way east of mona lake it was insane it was like 15 miles downwind and so and i'm not going to go there there's no place to land you know and surface winds were monolake which is just just foamed up so i'm at three like 3 000 feet agl and i'm looking at lee vining that's my only landing option other than maybe a field on the edge of you know next to mona lake or something and i went holy shit that's the i think the only time i ever wish i was in a car or on the ground just not in a plane and uh i mean the wind it's a 90 degree land

in that much wind and it's not really just gonna flop are you just gonna flop well that's that's a

problem it's um you know you're kind of you're you're a test pilot now and i i i i remember going shit how am i gonna do it i'm landing in a 90 degree cross when it was it must have been blowing 40 you know 50 knots it was gus it was it was just nuts and so i set up and i'm crabbing you know pointing at the runway and then i just you know you're just downwind of this 12 000 foot peaks and you just don't know what you're going to get into with turbulence and all this other crap and i'm at about 2000 agl now i'm downwind super high and all of a sudden you know i'm i'm i'm adding some knotage you know because i'm adding some speed because i you know you just don't know what you're gonna hit and so suddenly i'm on downwind at about 2000 agl and the air the whole bottom drops out my i mean just the whole plane just drops my legs which were hanging out underneath this instrument panel rip through the pan you know just rip the panel out of the console so the console gets shoved up and

it just drops down and i'm like oh my god i'm gonna die i'm gonna die i'm going into

the stick you know and so it's blocking the stick and i just throw the freaking panel forward and shove the stick over and my airspeed just went to like zero and i went holy here we go now i thought it was going to die and um so i just dumped the nose over and just waited and i probably lost you know a thousand feet in the whole thing just get my air speed back when i got my air speed back and i just went holy and i just i just pointed for the runway because there's boulders all around the airport property there so you know you're not going you're not going to survive that. So I, all I wanted to do was get that, that glider in the confines of the airport. I didn't give a shit if it was going to roll up in a ball or what. I just wanted to get it over the fence line, you know, into the property. And so I did that and I'm hauling ass now, you know, I got my airspeed back and, and, uh, turn on the final, get over the fence.

And now I've got clipping along at a pretty good ground speed. And, um, there's only so much wing down you can put into a crosswind. So I landed kind of at a crab and, you know, with my wing down and then I'd landed on the runway. And then at about 20, 30, you know, 30 knots airspeed, I couldn't, I couldn't keep the glider lined up with the runway because of the crosswind, you know, so it just went off into the sagebrush and then came to a stop. And then I'm like, holy shit. And so I'm like, is there anybody there? No, it's a ghost town. So yeah. So I'm sitting in the glider. And so I start, so I've got my big expedition suit, you know, buddy, my client K2, he gave me a suit. So I was wearing that. So you've got all this shit in the cockpit. You're just jammed up on the sink. So I'm trying to undo my, as I'm trying to undo all this stuff, the whole glider picks up off the ground because of the crosswind.

Cause the right wing was kind of, it was, the wings were semi-level cause they're resting on the sagebrush, but it picked up just enough, like three or four feet off the ground and slid down wind and settled down again. I went, Oh, holy shit. It's going to flip me over with this thing in it, you know, and then that's, what's going to kill me. So I just opened the canopy, chucked it up and then held onto it and was able to climb out and keep it from getting ripped out of my hands. And I ran to the upwind side of the ring wing. And then I just, I just got, got on top of the wing and then the upwind side just kind of laid on it. And then I just remember just getting pelted with just gravel. It was blowing that hard. And then about 10 minutes later and I go, and I'm thinking, what am I going to do here? Cause there's no one around. I mean, there's no one, no one's around. So I go at some point, I'm going to have to let go of this thing and the gliders gone.

It's it's it's toast. So about 10 minutes later, this truck comes up and it's this guy, Dennis, he owns the mobile station down there at Levi. Right. And he's got a Cessna, um, like a one 80 or something in the hangar. So he comes up and we could barely hear each other cause the wind's blowing. So, you know, we're screaming, I'm like, yeah, I need to get, just get a car on the upwind side of this wing. So,

you know, I'm like, I'm going to get a big truck. So it

doesn't flip over. So he goes, okay, I'll get a big truck. So, so yeah. So Dennis gets all these Mexican guys and they, you know, they, they come, come down with, it's like a watering truck or something like that. And they, they block the upwind side of the glider. And then we kind of like, okay, now, you know, let's get our wits together. So we got like six guys lifted up out of the sage brush and we just kept the truck on the upwind side of the wings. We push it back towards the, towards the hangar. We tied it down behind the hangar on the downwind side. And, and, uh, the wing tips were hanging out the way those guys were around. Oh shit. So we get, I go, how did you see me? He goes, he goes, I didn't see him. He goes, he goes, one of my cooks was standing at the window overlooking, you know, the model lake going, Hey boss, look at this fucking wind is blowing. So it was just, I mean, it was like, it was like the middle Pacific, the whole model lake, which is a sea of foam, you know, then he saw the glider and he goes, Hey boss, look in the airplane.

Dennis went, Holy shit. That guy's going to be in trouble. So that's when they got in the truck. Luckily they saw me. So that day semis rolled over. I mean, trees are blown down and, and, uh, it was just, it was, it was hell, but these,

these days with things like sky site and being able to tap, you know, if you got, I'm assuming sometimes you have self cut, what do you have up in the, when you're really high, you're not getting selling anymore. No,

no, not really. Um, I do start to lose it at

17, 18. Yeah. Yeah.

Right. Yeah, we, we do. It's kind of, it's kind of in and out. I've got a Garmin InReach so I can text with the, with the in reach. And then I also have a sat phone. So I've got on like on the down flights, I've got the sat phone capability and I'll stay in touch with a, uh, bunny mind. Who's a retired meteorologist, a glider guy too. Cause he can give me, he's got to give me weather updates. Like when I blew up and when I launch out of here, I got to get up to 28,000 feet. And then I go down wind. I got to stay clear of the Fallon restricted airspace. So I, I head out, along the ranges, basically heading out towards the rubies. So once I get the rubies, yeah, I'm talking to salt Lake then rubies just generate monster wave. So if I get the rubies and I can get a big climb out of there and then make a run towards Logan, Utah out towards bear Lake and then bear Lake, that whole range just west of bear Lake generates big wave and then climb up there and then go off to the wind rivers and then the big horns and then shit it's so.

That's insane,

man. That's insane. Oh my God. So, but when you're back to this near death thing, when it was obviously really scary, these that's 20 years ago, these days are, can you just totally avoid that? Or are you still taking that kind of risk? I mean, is that something that had you had what you have now technology wise sky site, would you have known that would you, would you have known? Yeah. I think sky site.

Sky site will show that they'll okay. I think sky sites. Yeah. I mean, sky site will show that. And nowadays a lot of guys go, well, I'm not going to take off today because the forecast for the winds to be, you know, gusts in the 40, 50 knots, you know, when you, I go, well, if, if you, if you base it off, if you just don't fly every time, cause it's the forecast is going to be, it may or may not be that. I don't know. But I said, if, if, if I just didn't fly every time, cause the forecast is going to be gusts. And I didn't, it was uncomfortable. I never fly. So as long as you have alternates, you're like something that's into the wind, whether it's Carson or going downwind and landing in Hawthorne or something, as long as you have some, some bailout points and then, you know, then you have options, you know, but, uh, you,

you said something, you said something interesting early on that I don't know that I understand. You said, usually it's winter. Cause you're looking for the lows and they come through with the Southeast. What I don't, sorry, sorry, sorry. Southwest. Yeah.

You're, you know, anti-cyclonic, uh, winds. And so you're, you're, you're, you're flying, you're flying pre funnel frontal on that, but is that long enough for you? I mean, usually when I think of a low, it's coming through pretty fast as opposed to, you know, like, like a really sustained high pressure westerly, I would think would be more with this, this, the flight you did was in June. Was that a big low or was that, uh, that

was a, yeah, that was a very unusual situation. To have a low come down this far. I mean, getting up a low hit in Seattle or Washington in the summer that that happens, but for it to reach down this deep, this far South, very unusual, but it's a really good question you pose because there are times where lows are too, the trough is too deep and it's too, too rapid a front. I'm not saying you won't get weighed. You'll get weighed, but just a very short period of time. So you go, okay, what can I do with that? Is there anything kind of do a big flight? So you might just pass on it or just, you know, go monkey around and I've done flights like that where it's just my, my last flight was just a really mediocre low, just like, Hmm. Yeah. It's, it's normally I wouldn't fly, but I still banged out like 1500 kilometers, you know, on that, that day.

So, and I think, so as long as

you don't get jaded and you're, you're just chasing a 3000 K, you can go out on those shorter troughs and still fly away and have fun, but it's just, it's going to go through too fast to break your records. Is that right? Yeah. Do I understand that? Right. Okay.

You're right. Cause I mean, they're, they're the classic situations is to get a prolonged, like a really kind of a shallow low that comes in and just feeds energy for like two days. And we get that maybe, maybe once or twice a year, you know? So for me, What about

these, what about, you know, like last winter when we had just, what did, what did California get? 11 atmospheric rivers. Does that work? Are those good? Are they? No. So

those see, Those end up getting too wet because it's just too much moisture and it's just, yeah. Once, you know, once they have, there's a point where they have so much energy and so much moisture in them, they just cross the Sears and they end up, you know, a lot of times these lows were flying, it's prefrontal systems, you know, whole West side of, of the Sears just getting hammered. And, you know, you're on the, on the Lee side and protected by essentially the Sears or whatever's holding back that weather. But, um, like last year there, there weren't too many flyable, days where you could have done anything big because these things were just coming in and just pumping moisture and you can't, you can't fly in that once, once that low, that jet access get ends up kind of hitting like Minden area and going south and you're, you're, you're in an area of too much moisture.

So that's why looking at the, looking at the 500 millibar, we call it the 560, the 564 line, that kind of, you know, marks the jet access. So you, Okay. And then once again, Okay. Sky side, you go, okay. Sky side showing the moisture pumping through. And sometimes it'll pulse where the wave will shut down here and you can be down the Owens Valley, just banging out term points, run up and down. And then, then it, you know, it'll pulse and then open up here in the afternoon. That's happened with me too, where I, I sneak back home, you know, but you know, there's a lot of experimenting and, and there's still a lot to learn with this stuff. And, and that's what makes this stuff so fascinating. This is just like with you guys, it's, it never gets. It's boring. Cause there's always, you know, there's always some, you always find you go, what the, what the hell was that all about?

You know, with that one thermal or, you know, I got low there. Why was that cloud wasn't working? You know, what the hell's going on here? And so, I mean, I,

I, I want to talk about that too, but the, the, as I understand it with you guys with sailplanes, you know, there, you have a lot more knowledge cause it's just been going on a lot longer, but what we talk about in, in paragliding is that, you know, the. Yeah. Yeah. The amount of stuff to be done in this part of the world. Is literally mind boggling because we've barely touched the surface. Whereas in Europe, you know, our FAA triangles, you're talking, you were talking about how do we measure our distances? You know, our FAA triangle, same as yours, you know, those are the, those are the bees knees. That's where you get all the points. That's what we want to do. It's, it's a lot more technical and difficult than just going downwind one way. Right. So, you know, coming home is, is way more sexy, but in Europe.

You know, the. It'll really be. A huge surprise. If somebody flies a huge triangle, that's not just a little bit bigger than what, what 50 people have already done. You know, there's, there's nothing there is just. Wow. That's never been done. I mean, in the Alps, most things have been done. They're just getting bigger. The gliders are getting better. You know, people are figuring it out. We're flying faster, you know, but like what. What's his name? The Klaus is doing sailplanes over the med, you know, I'm sure for you guys, that's just like, Whoa, that's a, that's a big deal. But here in the west, is it the same with you guys? Is there just, if you barely scratch the surface or. I think so.

Make it a bit bigger. Okay. Yeah. No, I think.

I think it's, I think the script and then the surface has been scratched, especially now the capability of doing the using the MVGs. Yeah. Cause now it's. Describe,

describe it. Describe what that is. We're going to get to the big pipe. It depends on what you just said. Yeah.

So, so the night vision, the MVGs and the night vision goggles, um, and like, um, you know, you got to admit this thing, but these are, these are what I'm, I'm using. And so these are actual, these are used by the actual mill. This is used by the military. These are, these are the no shit. These are like 18 grand a piece for these things, you know, but it's, it's, it's insane. I mean, using these things and you feel. Once you get the experience with them, it's, I mean, that's about as close to flying off the boat as possible. You know, when you take off on a pitch black run, I took my buddy up a few weeks ago and, uh, he's another FedEx guy and he was just going. Holy shit. Cause he was sitting in the back and he, I said the first, first touch and go, cause I've got the jet with the glider.

He just put the goggles up. He goes, it's pitch black. He goes, I can't see him. He goes, I can't see a thing. He just heard the wheel touchdown. He goes, oh shit. I guess. So the next week, he goes, Oh my God, that's insane. Yeah. We're flying along the ridges, you know, right. The ride along the Kingsbury at fricking 11 o 'clock at night. And it is pitch black. I go put the goggles up. He goes, holy shit. We're dead. You know? So I think with, with the goggles now with, with wave and Ridge cause Ridge will work at night too. And that's where I think you guys, cause I, you know, when you said you want to talk to me, I'm going, we, we gotta figure something out with these pair gliders, something to get. I'm going to get these guys to just start smashes, like, like dudes taken off, off the Appalachians, you know, with NBG's pair gliders and, and just doing a massive flight and just blowing everyone's mind.

And I think that stuff is possible, you know, with you guys. Hold

on. Hold on. I gotta, I gotta somehow silence all that last bit. I'm the only one that heard that.

Wow. Really? Oh my God. That's amazing. Yeah. I keep thinking, how are we going to occur to us?

I, you know, cause I don't know why. It would totally work. I've always been intrigued with, with, you know, the pair gliding and the hang gliding stuff. And, you know, I see you guys now in the Sierra and I just go just rip pull up in the thermals. Like, man, that's cool. He's dudes hanging out there and I think it's kick ass.

Yeah. The, the, the, the only thing is, of course, is we can't fly in that kind of wind, you know, we have to be, it would have to just be rich. Yeah. I mean, so I think,

I honestly think something with ridge, uh, if you now with, yeah, with wave, I just, I've been thinking like constantly about how you guys can do something with wave. I don't think it's safe.

They have done it in hang gliders. I don't know if you saw that, uh, Johnny Duran, uh, Red Bull athlete flew in wave and hang glider down in Australia. And, you know, it was, it was pretty wild. I mean, the, the footage. And that's mild way there.

You know? Yeah. Totally. Exactly. Yeah. That's my stuff. I

don't know. I don't know that we could do it. Well, that's, that's what I wanted to ask you. So next we're, we're, we're going to get to this insane flight, but why we're still back here, the, what is, what is taking off look like? How do you get started? How, how does it work? How, how do you get going? You're talking about, you know, you're at 24,000 feet back in this kind of by today's standards. So, so

the typical scenario with, with, uh, you know, whether you, whether you tow or self launch, you know, I can self launch now, cause you know, I've got the, I've got the jet that allows me to take off most. The jets very unique. Typically you're going to either tow up or self launch up to about three or 4,000 AGL. And, um, from Minden that, and that involves heading west from the airport, you know, four or five miles basic towards the Kingsbury grade. Yeah. And, you know, at 3 95 and then climbing up to a three or 4,000 AGL most of the times, and then getting into the wave right there, working your way up and then getting into that laminar flow and then, you know, off, off you go. So, um, how long does that take?

Uh, like on that big flight I did, it was, I probably ran the motor for like seven minutes. Um, climbed to about 30, 3,500 AGL and then shut it down and got right into the wave. And then, and. I was able to, I was using sky side cause you know, I had the NBGs. It was, it was, uh, it was dark outside, obviously. So I had the NBGs, no, no markers. So I went right to where sky site, there was just a little tiny pocket of where sky site said there was going to be wave. I just motor right to it. Boom. There was shut the motor down, stoves and the fuselage doors closed. Now you're totally clean. And then, uh, you know, our flight recorders, that's when our flight recorders will monitor either. They'll monitor that engine noise. And so it'll say, okay, that's when you're soaring.

The beginning of your soaring begins when that motor shut down. So it's either through vibration or sound. So, and

when you, when you cut off the motor, or if you're, you don't have a motor and you, and you, you cut off your toe and you're in, you're in the wave, what does it feel like? What does it, how long does it take to get from 3000 AGL? It depends. Sometimes

you end up sent to a lot of times you end up in pretty rough air, um, kind of in the rotor sometimes. And yet sometimes working up into that. There's other times where you can climb right up and it's just, you, you, because for a minute, you'll typically fly through the rotors. You get the shit knocked out of you flying through the rotor. And then once you punch through that to the west of that, or to the windward side, you get into this it's glass smooth. It's just totally glass smooth, laminar smooth. I mean, you can put a glass of wine on the dash to fly the whole day that way, you know, in that smooth air. But if you get down. Like in the, in the sea. Cause since the Owens Valley, since the Sierra is so high down there, um, you, if you get down to 16 or 17,000 feet in, in the Owens Valley, you can be hitting the rotor already there.

And you just, it's the Owens Valley is violent. You know, it just gets ugly. So, um, I try to stay up high. We always see

it's one of the most violent places on earth.

Oh yeah. And it is for you guys too. Oh yeah. I mean, especially with winds like that. It's, uh, um, yeah.

It's, you know, there's stuff that you, you know, you just, your palms get sweaty just talking about, you know, but, uh,

What kind of, uh, you know, so I'm just trying to give those who don't, you know, I've never been in a sailplane. You got to pull, you got to come out. You know, I've done, I swear to God, you, you know, it'll blow your mind. I

will be the best.

I will never go to sleep. I will keep it rocking, buddy. I promise you I will be the best co-pilot ever. I have got to do this. It sounds amazing. And those of you who are listening, when we get to the plane, it's going to blow your mind. But yeah, when

you, when you feel that when you see the energy out there, when you're, I mean, we're indicating like in the, in the Owens Valley, you're indicating 140 knots. You're going up 1500 feet a minute at 27,000 feet. This is like, holy shit. You gotta be kidding

me. Seriously. I mean, last time I was

down there, I was, I was, I had to stay below 18 because I didn't, it didn't give me clearance because they were working a bunch of traffic out there. Uh, Joshua Tray is going up. Or Barstow because of thunderstorms. And the guy said, I can't give you your sage too. Stand by, stand by. And I'm literally at 17.5 at 141 knots indicated, which is my max V and E at that, at altitude. And, and I had the spoilers out trying to stay below 18,000 feet and I'm just, just going up. You're going 170

miles an hour. That's, so, so what, you know, trying to give people a sense for what this feels like when you're in the, when you're not in the glass. You're in the, you know, is it, is it when you're in a commercial jet landing at Denver on one of those really, really bad days and thunderstorms everywhere? Is that what it feels like? Does it, or is it worse? How much, how much can these planes that you're flying handle? They're really strong.

Um, what you, what you don't want to do is flying to that kind of turbulence. Like in that the only turbulence you'll find associated with mountain wave is, is that rotor and that rotor will be basically from the ridge top. Level potentially down to the surface, you know? So, um, once you get above, once you get above that ridge top level, so let's just say from heat, you know, in this area, from, from here down to the Owens Valley, if you're above 14, 15,000 feet, you're not going to hit any of that rotor. But if you like fall out of the wave and you have to reestablish yourself into wave, you might fall down below the ridge tops. And that's happened to me plenty of times in those soft spots between. Yeah. Like, uh, Bridgeport and, uh, Bishop, you know, where you're like, oh shit, here we go.

You know, and you're, you're 24,000 feet next time. Next thing you know, because the sink rates, you can hit some heavy sinking wave too, you know, where you're going down. Sure. Two, 3000 feet a minute. So it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's as bad going down as it is up. So if you get in the down part of that wave, let's say, um, let's say you get, you drift too far downwind or you're it's blue wave and the sky site, let's say sky sites wrong. You're, you're fishing around and like all of a sudden, holy shit. Now, now I'm in 2000 feet a minute sink. Like, oh shit. You always work through your upwind side, but you might be ended below that ridge top level. And that's happened to me where you, you make a big jump in a dead zone and now you're 13,000 feet and just like, just getting that shit knocked out of you, you know, and you're working that rotor trying to get back into the rotor.

Cause that rotor will have up and down, you know, so the air is going. So you'll try to find more up than down. And then reestablish yourself back in west of the road into the wave and then punch, punch to the west and get to that laminar flow.

When you say you're trying to work it, are you working at like a thermal or are you turning, turning circles? It depends on the wind sometimes.

So, um, with our, uh, with our computers now we can see our track over the ground. So if I see myself, you know, obviously, you know, sometimes we're dealing with 60, 70 knot winds at, you know, 14,000 feet or whatever, but you make a turn downwind. You know, you're not going to get up. You're going to get a jet. And so a lot of times you kind of, you finagle it, you know, you go, okay, maybe S turns a worker. If you can remain stationary, you know, that's the key. And a lot of times with wave, the wind's strong enough to where you can, you can literally, you'll have a zero ground speed and be going up, you know, 2000 feet a minute. It's just, it's bizarre. Yeah. Oh yeah. I mean, last time I flew, I had a minus a negative eight knot ground speed, you know, so I'm climbing, getting pushed backwards. It's so. Yeah. I mean,

Paragliding condition. Now. Holy cow. Oh my. What's your, what's your trim speed on that glider?

All right. Now we're talking paragliding lingo here. Trim speed.

Well, what's so, so dead stick, dead air.

What are you, what's your speed? So we're probably about 60 knots. We call it like our best L over D speed. You know, it's like six, roughly 60 knots. Okay. The thing in like in these conditions we fly out here in the Sierra. I mean, a lot of times, you know, you're full stick for it and just you're, you're going VNE and it's just, you're just literally, you're just, you're cooking over the ground and you end up on a downwind leg. You know, I've had, I've had over 200, 200 knot ground, 250 knot, I think ground speed. It's crazy. God dang. That's incredible. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's a completely different ball game, you know, but you know, I mean, it's, it's all relative, you know, paragliding soaring, you know, it's going mountain bike and road bike.

Yeah. But man, that's, I

mean, I've never, I've never, you know, I've flown of course with a ton of sailplanes in the Alps. You know, we, we do a lot of thermaling with sailplanes and, you know, they come through and often they're racing from Slovenia all the way through into Germany and, you know, they, they do everything that we do, but much bigger. They're just going way faster. Yeah. It looks, but you know, when I, when I hear the stories, even friends of mine that, that fly sailplanes and also fly paragliders, they always kind of, they don't get that excited about it. They're always kind of, yeah, it's, you know, it's, it's, it's cool. We go farther, but I mean, listening to your stories is just, this doesn't seem like normal sailplaning to me to have heard

these kinds of stories. It's a little different. Yeah.! I mean, I, I, I do a lot of the thermal stuff, you know, and I, and I love it, but it's, it's when I start comparing my big thermal flights to the wave flights, like I'm working my ass off in the thermal stuff, you know, and I'm just like, shit, I'm just spending all this time circling, you know, and then you, you make a big long run. Spending half the time going all the way. Yeah, exactly. Like this isn't too efficient, you know, but, and that's what I think is, is pretty cool with the wave stuff. It's just the, the energy that it gives you. Yeah. It's just the energy that is out there. It is insane. I mean, there was back in the Sierra wave project, there's a story of a guy in a P38, you know, that got in a mountain wave near Bishop and he shut both motors down and P38 climbed to like 30,000 feet with no motors in a P38.

What? Yeah.

God, man,

that's incredible. I mean, it's just the energy is just nuts, but. How do you deal, how do you deal with ice? Is that a thing for

you guys? Yeah. I

mean, a lot of canopy icing and stuff like that, but I, you try to, you don't want to fly in clouds because you know, once you get that wing iced up, it's not coming off, you know, until you get down low. But we have had issues with icing, but what I do now is I put a, like an inner layer of plexiglass. So it forms like two layers and there's a, there's like an air pocket between the inner layer of plexiglass and the canopy and that air pocket gets warm enough where no ice, no ice forms. And it's, it works. It works magically. Okay.

So you don't, but you don't have to worry so much on your, I'm not an airplane, ailerons or whatever, cables or however, flaps

and all that stuff. Yeah, you, you do. I mean, but you'll only, you'll only get into that stuff if you fly, if you're high enough and it's cold enough, that won't be an issue. But if you're, well, let's say probably in the high teens or, you know, in the, you know, mid teens, high teens and low, you know, low twenties. And you're flying to college. And that's

that that that that

that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that

that that

that that that that

that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that

that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that

that that that that that that that that

that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that or why a mayor now's a ray or something, you know, it's, it's, it's the biggest to

the bag. It's the big stuff. So, so tell me again, I keep alluding, sorry to the listener, but this is so fascinating. I keep alluding to this big flight. We're going to get there, but the, tell me about your aircraft. Cause the, I have some sailplane friends. When I, when I told them, Hey, I'm going to get Gordon on show. What do I need to know? They were all really excited about your plane. Why is your plane so special? Well,

there are only four in the world that are, um, and there's nothing specific special about the sailplane itself. It's, it's a Schemperth Arcus, um, glider manufactured in Germany. It's kind of a, it's the Ferrari for two seaters right now, you know, that that's, that's being built probably the most popular high performance two seater out there. So, um, the story on my glider is that about five years ago by a guy by the name of Dennis Tito, he spent, uh, a week up in the space station with the, went up with the Russians, you know, guys, you know, adventure, big money. He ordered four Arcus's from Germany, brought them over here. He was very fascinated with the wave stuff and flying wave.

He said, okay, I want a jet engine put on them on the, on all four of them. He had that done. And, Oh, he told the manufacturer, he told Schemperth, he said, Hey, I want, I want you to do some, uh, some, uh, redesign of your aircraft. I want to figure something out so I can fly at a higher airspeed than, than the manufactured air, you know, uh, the placarded air speeds. So I want to basically a faster glider. I want the jet engine, I want auto flaps on it. So I don't have to monkey with the flaps. And then I also want, uh, all the instruments coded for, for night vision goggles and I want night vision goggles. And so he had four of these gliders, um, made up, brought them over here. His intent was to have two down in Argentina, to fly the wave down there.

And, uh, so he had two in Minden, and I think he shipped a couple down there to Argentina, did some big flights down there and up here. And then after about four years, he goes, I'm done. And so he sold two to, why

was he, why was he done? I don't know. No idea. I got to check the box.

Yeah, okay. So, so two were sold to Airbus. So Airbus bought two, um, for doing research and things like that. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And so these

aren't part of the Perlan project. Yeah. Well, yeah.

Well, no, technically no, but they're owned by, they are owned by Airbus. Some of the Perlan guys are using one of the gliders for contrail testing, that kind of stuff. So it's kind of torn up. And then the last two were for sale and the buddy of mine was doing all this flying with Dennis Tito. And so when that, those last two, you know, were up for sale about a little over a year ago, I'm like, I don't know. I've never flown that thing that that that that that that that that that that that that big one and then uh i've got a bunch of thousand kilometer flights and thermals and so

um yeah it's just been so i just i just hit the ground running with this thing and then i finally got called on the nbgs because you got to be signed off with the night vision goggles so i got a guy to sign me off with that and then tim garter who who flew with dennis tito he was called on the nbgs and and uh we did some night stuff here um because it's a whole different ball game you know it's it's you gotta you gotta be kind of on your game with flying at night you'll get night vision goggles because everything's field of vision you know your field of view is really narrowed down so it's it's it's a different ball game but once you get used to it it's cool but anyway i'm going for this this is the machine and i just like started like going all right you know so the first the first year um it was pretty much doing i i've landed at night and stuff like that but then on that june 19th flight i'm like

okay i think i feel comfortable off of these goggles to try a at least an overnight flight i had no intention of flying that far i just called my partner i sold half the share of partner my partner of mine that was a fedex guy but not yet rated in glider so he so his first flight in the glider was like well a thousand kilometer thermal flight with me this second one was another thousand then he did a two thousand kilometer flight so i called him up on this flight and he said hey man i said the wave's gonna line up it's just it's not classic it's just it's gonna be an okay wave day but if you want to try to just do an overnight flight and you know or just fly all night because my main goal was to kind of see how i was going to be able to handle the temperatures up at altitude in the 20s at night because typically it will get unbearably cold you know because i've flown at night but not for long not for hours but um it gets wicked cold

so i'm like let's see what we can do here and so that was kind of the whole purpose of that flight was just to kind of fly you know at night till like noon and then i i texted matthew scutter sky so i'm like matt check out the weather i mean what do you think and he goes he goes yeah the wave's gonna shut down at about two o 'clock and i go that's what i'm thinking i said well can you run the bottles all night no in the afternoon so i figured it was gonna go from evening you know all night and then until two o 'clock so and it was not a classic day it was on a scale of one to ten it was probably a maybe a five so you know after i'd land i go holy shit on a good day man imagine what you can do you know way

no way so this is just an average day yeah

that was i probably would not have i probably would not even have flown it was more of like hey let's just go do an all-nighter you know because because it was june 19th i go well shit it's it's warm it's not wicked cold it's not winter it's you know it's just it's gonna be tame as far as temperature temperatures goes let's say bruce if you want to go up we'll go do some nvg work you know and so it turned out um yeah we went do you have some kind of heater

in there do you have any no do you have any warm air blowing on you or anything oh god no

just because you're just you know what do you

what do you wrap up in what are you wearing so

some guys ask about the electric stuff you know electric clothing the problems with that is the problem with that is if it first of all it fails and you don't have the the backup in other words the thick stuff it's game over it's like oh we're done yeah you know yeah might as well land so i wear a big climbing you know that expedition suit and then some layers underneath the problem with that is if you get down low and you end up in a thermal situation that happened with me like when i flew my caster i flew from here to steamboat colorado and i ended up over the wasatch well wave completely fell apart and it's like now i'm down in thermals and i'm just pouring sweat in the cockpit you know it's just like holy shit i'm cutting there you're just trying to stay hydrated you know so that can turn into a bad situation if you end up low you know but this flight we suited up and and uh you know it's like yeah what time you want to meet yeah you know it was father's father's day the day before so my dad was in town so we had we had dinner and we just kind of moseyed out the airport like yeah shit we still gotta put gas in the thing and so we just took our time and took off at 2 30 and just why 2 30 that's just because it was too i don't know i don't know i don't know i don't know i don't know it was just 2 30 and it was so i was so unprepared for the flight not unprepared but i was i didn't really have big ambitions i mean so much so that i didn't i didn't call oakland center for a clearance until we're actually pulling the glider out with the car we're and i just called oakland center at like two in the morning like hey man i'm uh i'm gonna be launching it like half an hour he goes you glide in a glider i go yeah he goes i got mbgs and he goes huh he goes i said i'm looking for a clearance so we can get get a clearance in the class a he goes he goes well we're not too busy he goes i shouldn't be a problem he goes let me go to the floor and talk to the controllers let them know your you know what's your call sign you know 189 del tango like okay i'll let him know so as soon as we climbed up and got to 14 000 feet that gave me an ifr clearance and he'll have at it so it was a really windy uh evening you know winds are blowing it was almost too much for you know too much crosswind for takeoff but uh you know we did we did we did we did we did we did we did we did we did we did we did we did we did we did we did on mbgs on a pitch black runway and then um from

minden yeah

yeah man and uh so we like i said we climbed up about 30 you know three thirty five hundred agl or something and um the little funny thing is you know your suit it's just the two of us i don't have a support team it's like let's get our shit and throw it in the airplane you didn't have

you didn't have ground you didn't have a ground person no no like a weather person no

we're just you know what's yeah it was just supposed to get low

expectations you're just gonna go through you

know and i never have it i just i'm always kind of a one-man show anyway you know i don't have a big support team you know launching me run the wings i just let the you know do my thing and keep it simple so anyway bruce the guy that was flying with i put him in the front seat because i'm six five and it's more room in the back seat so he never he never used mbgs so i think i'm a tutorial on you know do this don't don't do this and i'm like i'm gonna do this and i'm gonna do this and i'm gonna do this you know make sure that you know so he was clueless on the mbg he'd never used them you know so he sits in the front seat and i said just get and you know you're you're putting 10 pounds of shit in a five pound bag you know it's one of those deals so he said just put all your stuff on the ground here so keep in mind it's it's pitch black so i got the truck running the lights on you know lighting up the fuselage and so he's he gets in and he's trying to get squared away and the wind's blowing and like crazy and so i start handing him all this shit on his lap and he's you know he's not used to these big flights he's not used to the glider thing you know so he's i get down to the last few items and there's a blue cube thing and i go bruce what the fuck is this he goes oh it's a bluetooth speaker i thought we could maybe listen to some music and we're up there i go are you shitting me what do you think this is you know got some michael buble going here what so we don't have the room for this crap so you know and he had a big you know it's like he was

you know had this five pound bag of nuts and i'm like dude what do you what is this naked and afraid or something so anyway i get him in the front seat and i get in the back and so it's kind of chaotic because the winds are blowing i get the motor started and uh we start you know we start a takeoff roll and you know it's noisy with that that jet going and all and then we get to about 20 knots it's a big enough runway so so we get to about 20 knots and he's like oh my god i'm gonna get in the back of the car and he's like oh my god i'm bang bang bang bang and i go oh shit what's that so i've you know brought the throng back to idle stop the airplane and i i had a figure it was my shoulder harness sure enough my shoulder harness was hanging outside of the canopy and uh banging on the leaning edge of the wing so i opened the canopy up you know and then strapped in and i just got i i just got you know first of all fatigue i was up all day you know got up at seven o 'clock that morning so i was i'm dead tired and i'm doing this shit with these mbgs i'm going what am i doing here so we

So I got the shoulder strap on. We blast off. We get to about 100 feet. Canopy opens.

Holy shit. And I go, you know, it's one of those things that add up. You go, I probably should not be doing this. You know? And I came back close. That's

two. You get the three. We got a rule. If it's three, you got to abort. I didn't have three.

I was able to grab the canopy. We got it shut. I'm like, man, this is just not going well. You know? And that had never happened to me, you know, ever. Yeah. And I'm going, hmm. You know, maybe this is not just the right thing. So we just, we motored out and got in the wave and climbed up to 24,000 feet and then headed on south. And then started our journey, you know, 17 hour and 40 minute journey. So I

read your article. I would love, I know you've given other interviews about this, but it was beautiful that you talked. You talked about the beauty, even with the NVGs. Oh. What does it look like? What do you? It was wild. I've seen a bunch of your photos flying these FedEx jets, you know, around the world and they're amazing. And those of you listening, you got to follow Gordon on Instagram. It's amazing. But I mean, what are you seeing that night? Because it just sounds like, I think it just would blow my mind if you

see it. Yeah, it's, you know, it's wild because, you know, we had it. We had it. It's wild. It was in the south, which was right in the direction where, you know, you know, the Milky Way was just hanging over the entire canopy. And so you're sitting there with your dim lit instruments. Biggest snow

year in history, you know.

You're sitting there with these, the dim instruments, your varios going, you know, and you're at 20,000 feet and it's pitch black outside. And you know, you know, because there's nothing between here and like Bishop, right? And so, you know, it's just magical, you know, and it wasn't cold. And I remember. I remember telling Bruce, I said, this is just nuts. We're just looking at the Milky Ways. And it's a shame that everyone doesn't have a chance to look through like legit night vision goggles because the amount of stars you see is unbelievable. It's, I mean, you're looking at satellites, you know, like left and right shooting stars, you know, all, you know, and here you are with a, in a glider, 27,000 feet, flipping along 150 knots over the ground, you know, just, it's like, wow, it was just magic, you know.

And you're the only gig in town. Cause there's no one up there, you know? And so it was, it was, it was neat. We get down towards like mammoth and everything's going well. And we had an issue getting in on the Joshua complex because they didn't open the airspace till five in the morning, which I didn't know about. So Oakland center's going, Hey, you need to get below 18,000 feet. I'm like, well, don't you handle the airspace when Joshua was not working it down there in the Owens? And they said, no. They said, you got to get below 18. I go. So what? No one's airliners on loud above 18 in that Joshua complex. He goes, no, it's going something. This is not right. I go, can you just verify that? He goes, let me check with my supervisor. So we're flipping along. I don't keep mine. I don't want to get below 18.

Cause he started getting into that rotor zone and, you know, and you know, it's pitch black outside. So he goes, yep. Sorry. Supervisors. You got to get below 18. So, you know, we're just kind of a bean Mount Tom. And I started just shoving the nose over descending and flying out of the wave. Well, flying into the Sierra out of the wave and then got to your space just below airspace, just below 18 and was able to stay out of the, out of the bumps, you know, all the way down. And then, um, you know, made my first turn point down your in your car, hook back North. No,

wait, how far South did you get? Are you going off the Sierras?

Yeah, we went down just about South, just about South, just about a beam in your current. So.

Oh, wow. Okay. Okay. So we

turned there and that's kind of where the wave kind of shuts down because the mountains change direction that, you know, down further South, it takes more of a Northwesterly flow. So the wave kind of shut down there. So I flew in a, a, a quite a big area of dead zone, like sink, sink, sink. And there's, there's a point where you cry open. You go, okay, we've got to turn back North, get back into the energy. Cause if you, if you fly too much into that sink and then you turn North bound into the sink. Now you're losing a lot of altitude. Next thing you know, you're going to be in the water. You're down at 13,000 feet and just getting, getting the crap beat out of you. So anyway, we turned back around and then about four 50, you know, Joshua approach gets on the frequency. Hey, all aircraft, Josh approaches up, you know, you know, up, up on frequency.

So I call him, I said, Hey, look for my stage two clears. He goes, you're cleared stage two, which gives me clears up to 29,000 feet. So then I just climbed back up into the low twenties and then work North and then right about a beam. Mount Whitney is where the NVGs came off. That's where I didn't need them anymore. And that was it. The sun's coming up. Yeah. God, it was just all pink. And it was just, it was insane. You know, what,

what was it? What was it? What were you get? What was it blowing

on Whitney? You think that day, the winds are off or it was probably Whitney was probably 40 knots, 50 knots on the peak. Cause we, we didn't see much up North, North Reno. We saw about 70 knots. You know, a wind up, up higher, but that day was fairly, fairly mild. Like I said earlier, if you get too much, too strong wind, it just, it just doesn't build. What people think, oh, the stronger the wind, the better way it's going to be. Not necessarily, you know, it could be too, too strong. And I've had that happen. That really hampers your movement over the ground too. You know, I've, I've been down your Bishop where it's, it's literally a hundred. We had a hundred knots on the nose all the way to Menden, you know, and.

Yeah. So you're going, how am I going to make ground speed? You know, you're doing 10 knots over the ground. You're watching the semi-trucks freaking blown by going up 395 past man. This is embarrassing.

So it just gets funky, you know,

what you said, it was kind of a five out of a 10 day, but was this nice wave? Was it nice wave flying? It was just, wasn't the, it

wasn't strong. It wasn't, it wasn't, it wasn't the light hair on fire type, you know, like the, the Owens Valley. And I told Bruce, he said, man, this is not, this is. We were having to change gears here where you're like, okay, let's slow up a little bit. You know, you gotta slow up, you know, there are bigger dead zones and this is not. You can't just rock it all day. I mean, there are days where you're, you're, I mean, like I said, I mean, I'll get me in one's Valley at 18,000 feet and doing 140 knots indicated. And I get down low behind them at 26,000 feet, still doing 140 knots indicated climbing. Just like, holy shit. It's almost, it's almost eerily strong, you know, where you go, it's just, this is just scary. You know, like, is this going to let me down? You know, there's only so much so fast you can fly before you start fluttering, you know?

So you don't want to, you don't want to get fluttered.

And I'm sorry for the ignorance here, but as I understand, you know, wave kind of stacks on that. What makes wave is it stacks on top of itself. Correct. I, those of you listening, can't see my hands, but it's kind of, you know, it's, it's kind of in a sense, folding on top of it, you know, that's how you can kind of keep benching up because. Correct. Is that, I understand that right?

No, if you, if you picture, um, like a, like a, uh, a big rock in a stream, you will see that, that water is water. We're just like air, right? So you'll see that water flow over that rock. And then downstream, if there's no other rock, it's just flat gravel bottom. You'll see those, those, uh, harmonics of, of wave. And that's exactly how mountain wave sets up. So, so there'll be a line, which is typically maybe halfway. So that's typically, you know, a mile in width that you can work the leading edge of that. Like, let's say there's lenticular, that wave will be, that lift will be on the leading edge or on the windward side of that lenticular cloud downwind of the mountain range. And that's typically, let's just say over the 3 95, you know, maybe five miles east of the spine of the, of the range for the most part, if you know where that wave is, you can really use that to an advantage, whether you're in a power plane or a glider, you know, I may hear guys.

They're there. They're down. You can hear them just getting the shit knocked out of them. You know, they're talking to Joshua, they're an assessment or something going now reporting severe turbulence. And I'm going, man, this guy just moves upwind, you know, two or three miles. He can shut his motor down if he wants to fly the whole way, you know, all the way up in glass there. So, so on the backside of that, on the downwind side of that, you know, that, that air mass goes up, it's coming down equally as strong. So, um, that's what, that's, what's killed a lot of people, you know, or. You know, first of all, you get the downwash off the Sierra. If you're too close to the range, you'll just get that downslope wind. That's just sometimes too strong for an average airplane, even out, out climb, you know, and then you'll downwind of that. You'll have the, the, the propagation of air mass going up in the, in the primary wave.

And then in between the up and the down part of the wave, you'll have that rotor up at kind of the ridge top level that is very, very violent.

But it won't, it won't, I guess. Maybe I wasn't. Describing a rider, I mean, I'd probably just lack of understanding, but it won't keep. So if you're looking at my hands here that, you know, you get the wave coming off Lee side of the, of the Sierras, that's what you're searching for. Uh-huh. Couldn't you just, you're flying north. Couldn't you just hang a 90 degree right and keep flying that wave in the Nevada or, I mean, just keep going east and keep, keep going with that wave? Well. Keep going with the harmonics? Well, yeah. If you,

yeah. If you commit to like a downwind flight, right. Which I, which I've done, you know, I, I climb up in the primary wave here, get up to 28,000 feet and then go east. The typical, typically those harmonics, they'll start getting lower. Like the secondary wave east of the primary wave will be set up lower and then they'll progressively get lower until it eventually dampens out. So, but yeah, I mean, uh, like going eastbound, which you'll try to do or pick up different waves, different wave systems off of different mountain range, like the Toyabes or the Rubies or, you know, these big pilot peak is, you know, north of Lovelock, you know, these ranges, sometimes you'll get, you'll get good wave off of those too.

So you can get new primary wave. Exactly. So what you do is you, yeah.

So if you go downwind, you basically go downwind, the case of go just to, to the slow as you can, like minimum sink speeds. You're like at 50 knots. It's very comfortable. You're not flying. You're not hauling ass. But your ground speed is because you got an 80 knot tailwind. So you're just clipping over the ground and you're letting the wind kind of do the work. So you just kind of float downwind and then maybe try to fly a hundred, 150 miles downwind until you get to another big range. And then once you get downwind of that, you kind of feel it. And as you're going downwind that very old start going, you know, and like, oh shit. And then you got to turn into the wind like really quickly because your ground speed is so flat fast and you'll fly out of the wave really quickly. So once you turn into the wind, now you're zero ground speed. Again, kind of nibbling around searching for the big stuff. And then once you find it, you stop, you just point into the wind and you got hopefully a zero ground speed and you go up to like an elevator back up to 28,000 feet and then turn downwind again for another hundred.

Yeah, exactly. So,

okay. So you're the sun's coming up. You're over Whitney. That's beautiful. You've got, you've, you've been in the air. What? Two, three, four, five, six. It gets pretty, pretty light. It gets light at five, I guess. Yeah. Probably.

Probably three, three hours. Uh, yeah. Three, four hours. Probably four hours. Yeah.

Okay. Okay. So you're almost halfway through, right? Just getting, what time did you land? You just get going.

Yeah. We landed, I think after sunset. Yeah. It was, yeah, it was four hours in a, in a 17 hour. So we, we still had 13 hours.

So yeah.

Yeah. What do you guys do? Are you taking shifts? Are you taking naps or what? How does this work?

No, I stayed awake. I stayed awake the whole time. What I try to do is, um, I tried to just kind of close my eyes, you know, in the airline world, you kind of learn to kind of take cat naps and, you know, these little cat naps seem to work pretty well, but I'd turn the volume on the Vario up so I could kind of hear what's going on because Bruce wasn't really aware of where to fly, you know, and you can get yourself in a world of hurt, like so quick, you know, if you, if you take a crab angle out, you know, on a South and Northbound track. And now, now your next thing, you know, you're going down 2000 feet a minute and going, dude, what happened? You know? So I, I, I just, I stayed awake the whole time, but I, I tried to practice, I closed my eyes and, and, you know, I was just listening to the Vario and as soon as I would hear something, you know, like, Oh, where's what happened to the left?

You know, I didn't wake up and I never, never slept. I never got in a rammer like that, you know, but, um, yeah, yeah. You just drive and you just run on adrenaline, you know, that goes. So that's pretty much how it works. But it's funny. The mindset went from, okay, well, we'll, uh, you know, we can, I think we need a thousand kilometers. No problem. You know? So we're coming back like, ah, that's cool. You know, we'll get, we got a thousand kilometers done. And then we got North of Reno and too much moisture, uh, North of Reno and the wave got really soft and like, okay, here we go South again. And so we ran back South and went pretty much ran back down to Inyo current and, and, uh, you know, nothing really, it was nothing really hard, you know, other than the, the, the, the, the T on the, most of these legs. And so we ran South again and yeah, there was, there was points where you're going, man, I'm dragging, you know, it's just, I'm hurting here.

I'm tired. We went back pretty much down the Inyo current, came back North, back up to Reno. I'm like, okay, if we can get 1500 kilometers, that'd be cool. You know? So we, we tagged that, you know, we got that notch. And so we went South again and, and now it's like, oh shit. I think we got it. We got 2000 kilometers. That's pretty cool. You know? And, uh, that finally became, what's your

average, what, what, what's your

average speed? Uh, for this, for the, for the entire flight, we average 110 miles an hour.

So on a less than stellar day, you know, it was, it was really, really kind of weird, but so that was a five, uh, that was a five turn point flight. And, uh, that's why it's recognized by the IGC for, uh, like a world record. Cause it was, you know, we use more than three turn points, but it's recognized by OLC and then we glide. Um, so what was the total distance? 3,058 kilometers. So Klaus had done 3,008 kilometers. It was, was that 1900? That was 1900 statute. I think that's what it comes out to. So yeah. So the, I mean, fast forward, everything was very last leg. It was like. Oh shit. I think we can get maybe 3000 K out of the same.

So I'm like, Bruce, uh, I said, here's the thing. I said, the wave's supposed to shut down. We saw all day that North Reno up near Susanville and that whole area, there was just a shit ton of moisture. And you go, there's just no wave up there. And uh, so I figured we would have to stretch our flight. A final leg would have to, we would have to get to like Altaurus or Cedarville or somewhere up in that area. And I thought the likelihood of that was going to be so slim because first of all, there, there wasn't any wave forecast. And then secondly, there was so much moisture up there. So I told Bruce on our final leg up the Owens Valley, I said, let's just, let's just get up. If we can get up to Reno, we'll just, we'll just kind of feel it out. And if it's, if it's shitty, we'll just come back and land. And you know, we will have gotten over 2,500 kilometers, which is still pretty, pretty freaking good.

So, so we get up the last leg we get up. So now I'm starting, I'm not tired anymore. Cause I'm like, you know, I'm just, I'm like this whole thing could become a reality. Now you're starting to wake up again. You're on a mission now. So we get up to Reno and it's, it's very, very weak wave, you know, just so spotty and sky-side once again, it was just working really well. There was, there were some markers. So I get just west of the Reno airport and I, I park in the wave and I've got zero ground.

I've got that thing that's like that thing that's like that thing that's like that thing

that's that thing that's that thing that that thing that that thing that that thing that that thing that that thing that that thing that that thing that that thing that that thing that that thing that that thing that that thing that that thing that that thing that that thing that that thing that that thing that that thing that that thing that thing that thing that that thing that thing that thing that thing that thing that thing that thing that thing that thing that thing that thing that thing that thing that thing that thing that thing that thing that thing that thing that thing that thing that thing that thing and overcast. It's like, holy shit, man, there's a lot of weather up there. So like, what about Cedarville? He goes, no, there's no, there's no AWOS for Cedarville. So there's no weather reporting there. So I figured I told him, I remember telling him, I said, Bruce, I said, typically east of that range of Cedarville, it's you're out of desert. So it's kind of like all those mountains are holding the weather back. So it will probably be clear in the Cedarville area. So my flight computer was saying, you know, from our altitude, there's no way we had it made.

You know, we were going to, we were way below glide. So I'm like, oh shit, you know, if we can, we can at least manage a lower sink rate, you know, maybe zero sink for a while, then we could maybe kind of get up to glide. So I called, I called Oakland center. I said, Hey, is there any chance I can get higher? He goes, no, I'm able, you know, traffic or something. I said, Hey, this, and I actually told him, I said, this, this could potentially be the longest glider flight in history. I mean, is there anything we can work at? You know, and he goes, standby, you know, he goes, okay. You've cleared up to, you got what it was two five over something. So I just sat in like one or two knots of lift, just going, just climb it so slowly, just milking everything I could. And I got, I was like as high as I can. I said, all right, we're out of here. You know, so we started on the

day. Is it now? It was like four or five, six

o 'clock or six o 'clock. Okay. Yeah. It's getting, yeah. The sun angle is starting to get low, but I'm going get MVGs, right? Round two on the MVGs. So, so we started making a run out to the Northeast and, and I saw a huge layer of undercasts and I went, so we're headed out towards, in the direction of tourists from Reno. So we kind of had a, we had, I don't want to say quartering head when we were tracking about our heading was about three, four, zero. We're tracking about zero, three, zero, you know, cause we've got about 80 knots of wind.

And we're like, Oh, we're going to go to Reno. And we're like, Oh, we're going to go to Reno.

And we're like, Oh, we're going to go to Reno. And we're like, Oh, we're going to go to Reno. So, so the winds weren't really hurting us too much, but I started kind of heading for this big undercast, which is, I couldn't tell how far out in the distance it was and where we would be in relation to the undercast once we got there. But I go, Bruce, we can't fly. We're not flying through that. We're going to have to duck underneath that or, or pull the spoilers out. And I hope I was hoping we didn't have to do that. So I sent on this long kind of efficient glide out towards this undercast in the direction of our tourists. And we finally got to the undercast and we're maybe five miles from it. I go, this is going to work out perfectly. You know, I can just shove the nose over and we'll slide underneath it. I don't have to pull spoilers out and, you know, kill my glide to El Turismo. So I shoved the nose over and I slid underneath this thing. And then it got pretty dark.

And now there's this fricking snow showers left and right. And I'm just flying in between this stuff, trying not to get ice on the wings. So I'm just kind of weaving my way. You get to do that? I thought it was awesome. I'm weaving through this shit. I'm weaving through this stuff and I'm going, yeah, I said, you know, the fact that we're not doing a straight line, I said, this is, this is hurting us, you know? And so, um, finally, you know, we get to, we get to maybe 50 miles South of El Turismo and I, I can look off in the distance because it was hard to see because of all these snow showers, but I look off in the distance and I see this, the sun hitting this big patch of ground. I mean, oh shit, that's nice. A big blue hole, you know? So I kind of head. Headed for it. And I got in this big blue hole, this valley.

And then I made a left turn towards directly towards El Turismo. Now we're probably maybe 40 miles from El Turismo. And I just hit a, I just, I came up to a wall of moisture all the way to the ground. I mean, I felt like I was flying on the East coast or something because of all these different layers of clouds. And I went,

yeah, I

said, and the computer said, I'll never forget. It said 2,000, 988 kilometers. I was 12 kilometers short of 3,000 K. And you're looking at this wall of moisture going, do you know, you kind of go and do I do it? Do I do it? And I go, I go, Bruce, you can't do it. We'll kill ourselves if we do this. This stuff's going to the ground, you know? And I go, cause I don't have pedo heat or anything. You know, someone leaves all my instruments with the icing. If I fly into the stuff and Bruce goes, well, it's only 30 miles. I go, we're done. We can't do it. So I flipped a U-turn. You can see it on the trace. I sent you the WeGlide link, but I did a complete U-turn. I said, put Cedarville in the computer. So we got that in the computer and it said, we're like 4,000 feet low.

Plus our direct line from our point there to Cedarville, we would have had across the entire range, mountain range, which, you know, it was, it was co-op. There's no way you can do that. Plus it was so much cloud cover. So I had to go South first and then go to the South end of that range over the

coast. And then I had to go to the South end of that range over the coast. And then I had to go to the South end of that range over the coast. And then I had to go this

big high plateau. So before I could start going East out towards the desert and to where the Cedarville Valley is. So now my computer has given me my straight line computation, but I'm having to go make this big shuck and jive around the South end of this range. So all my numbers are out to lunch. So I'm going, so I ended up over this big plateau and I'm just kind of milking it going, holy shit. I don't want to get over the ridge here, you know, because we had like 15 miles. And I'm just a couple thousand feet over there over this plateau. And I'm just, just kind of milking it Eastbound and I wanted to, oh shit. And there was a field down there, like a farmer field. And I keep in mind, I I've got the, I've got the engine, but will it's, you know, is it going to start? I don't know.

You can't rely on it because you have to, first of all, you have to extend it. Then you have to start it. And you know, is it even going to start? So you can't really rely on that. I see a farm field out there. And I, once we got a beam, I go, there's no way we're going to land it there. It was a pipe dream, but, I ended up seeing the, when I saw the edge of the ridge and I kind of just eyeball, I said, Oh, I think we're going to make it. So we were able to cross over that ridge. And then once I got the sky started opening up a little bit more. And then I saw like a cumulus cloud over the Valley, about 30 miles South of 20 miles South of Cedarville. My computer still said 2,988 kilometers. So I hadn't, and I was pissed. I go, you know, I'm going all this way East, but I'm not adding miles. Right. I go North.

I'm going, so I go Bruce, I'm ahead for that cloud. And, and once I was able to see it, I go, that's a rotor cumulant. That's like a rotor Q cloud that was associated with wave. And then I could see some ragged, like wave that was setting up in the Valley there. I went, I think I can, if I get underneath this cloud, I can work it. So I get underneath this cloud and I'm maybe 2,500 AGL. And I still can't make Cedarville. Right. But there's now there's, there's a dry Lake I can land on, which was wet. You know, the glider would have been there for days, but I ended up circling underneath this thing and there's one knot, two knot, three knots left. Awesome. And I get up and then I push West of it into wave and it goes laminar. And all of a sudden it just goes.

And I started pressing North and the computer freaking finally numbers matched up for Cedarville and said, you got it made. And I'm like, Holy shit. So I ran North in that wave on the East side of that Cedarville range. And I'm like, Holy shit. And I'm like, Holy shit. And I'm

like that shit right over Cedarville and go that's, you know, by then it was already 3,030 kilometer or wherever and went all the way North until I ran into freaking snow showers again. And then just that was the that's where the distance was calculated all the way to that Northern point. And then I turned South and came to Cedarville and, and, and landed and we had 3,058 kilometers in bags. So we landed and cops show up and like, what the hell are these guys doing here? And I'm like, oh shit. on the phone going yeah that's uh 189 delta tango i confirm he's landed at cedarville and i go what was he goes that was the fa calling because they're wondering what they they thought you were landing at alturas because that was the last thing i told them i was landing at alturas and you didn't so the cops went to alturas first they didn't see an airplane that's just got planted in the mountain somewhere so they go shit let's try cedarville so like dude can you help us push a glider out of the way so we get out of this glider we tied down i had some tie down rope and tied it down on the line and you know now it starts kind of raining and drizzling and and um the guys tried to hook us up with a motel and there was nothing around everything was you know but now it's dark and uh so we showed up in these big goofy suits on these expedition suits

finally we he got some lady at the hotel to our motel to open the open the doors he goes yeah i got one room left and so we uh we got a room and then bruce found some people you know a few doors down they had a bottle of scotch and he bought a bottle of scotch you you just got in for that it was a good time you

didn't sleep obviously

because you're just i was gonna say

there's no way you slept even as even as exhausted as you were you said fire that's amazing i don't understand the the the record thing so it was the longest flight that's ever happened in a sailplane but it's not a record because it can only be three points is that right yeah that's a max

that's a max that the igc will so that's the maximum number of turnpoints that the igc recognizes three so it's like it's unofficially the longest you know klaus ohlman still has that world record for a three turn point which is three thousand and eight kilometers you know so that's why i've got i i think that's very doable out of here you know so i've gotta it's

gonna say if you had a five out of a 10 day yeah that's insane yeah you're in the air for how long 17 how

much 40 minutes yeah 17 hours so all night you know all day so yeah it's just it kind of gets you fired up and do more of this and then i think we can do some big massive triangles in the way you know like 1500 kilometer almost 2000 kilometer triangle flight you know run from maybe here down to in your current and out towards ely and then back up uh towards minden up to susanville and then you know so in your current your first turn point ely's your second and then susanville would be there like your third turn point and uh and

are you working you know are you working with rami are you working with a whole bunch of other gary down in albuquerque are you guys all kind of all working together or this is just your no

it's just my gig you know because not like i said not too many people are are in it yes i mean some some people are still some people are starting to get a little more interested in it you know intrigued with it with the wave stuff but not to the extent that uh you know they just most guys just aren't into that you know i mean most guys go home there's no way i could sit in in a freaking cockpit that long you know they're just not they just don't want to i'm not saying they couldn't you know it's just they don't have a desire or will to right you know i get it that's that's fine you know and it's just nothing nothing wrong with that just like they want to go go to bed and sleep at night i get it

there's stuff that can be done you know try it you know and we got the weather here to do it take advantage of it so right

how would you how would you do it with the three turn point thing i mean if you really if you um so what what's your vision now what do you well i do with this now it's

very doable so the problem we have here in the sierra with with waiver kind of in this area is that we're we're limited with north and south wise with wave because you get on the southern end of this uh wave area it starts to get too soft and the wave shuts down if you get too far north you know typically we'll run into moisture you know you start getting to that jet jet axis so whereas like argentina they they have a much longer area of mountains you know or they can run further north and south and that kind of thing but i think like with a turn three turn point um like klaus oman's thing would be take off here go down to in your current up to susanville back down in your current and then you'd land up and you know north of casper um wyoming which is uh which is very very very doable so if you take off here like like at 10 o 'clock at night and you get these these legs done in at night in in in a comfortable area geographic because we're used to this area

and we're used to the wave working in this area and do all that stuff during the night hours and as the sun comes up you fly and come up to minden and and then you start hitting off heading off to the northeast like what i do going downwind you know and then you know then you end up in then you end up on a downwind flight you know where you you got that massive tailwind and you just if you end up in your like the casper area that would put you over the 3000 kilometer mark so

and in the in the sailplane is there any poo-pooing oh no that's but these guys are doing it at night or is there any uh is there any friction there or is this just the whole community this is badass this is really cool right

now i think it's the badass or you know uh category i don't know where it's going to go in the future i i you know and what i tell everyone it's like you know whether this is a record i don't i can give a rat's ass you know it's more of you know you're opening up some boundaries you're exploring new areas and and you're utilizing technology and utilizing an air mass whether it's working day night you know it doesn't matter you know for i gotta go well let's he's doing it nighttime well sure i'm not doing anything illegal and if they say well you can't see a lot of the europeans they the germans they cannot even if they have a glider that's equipped that's uh equipped for night flight they cannot fly a glider there at night so all the europeans think that my

was not a record because i didn't you know a certain number of hours at night and they they don't have that luxury that we have and i even emailed igc and the uh the igc folks about it and the guy goes oh no he goes you're as long as you comply with the rules your country you're legal to do whatever because you're you're saying night that that would invalidate your flight he goes the fact that you'd use more three turn points does you know so i mean i could have used three you know so anyway that that's that's where we are with that whole thing but people are very fascinated i think the germans you know that i did a few test flights at night and i just posted it and just people went nuts like what the hell this guy's flying a glider before this 3 000 kilometer flight even came about the germans were calling me asking for you know interviews to to write articles just about night flight you know in a glider with night vision articles because they were so intrigued by that like holy shit this is pretty wild this is like james bond stuff

so it is james bond stuff so again

since i've been following you and watching your pictures and videos it's just fully james bond man you're 007 out there it's

it's pretty cool so it's neat that you know i haven't gotten much uh i haven't gotten any friction at all you know i haven't heard anything anything negative you know whether social media or is this word of mouth i haven't heard anything like oh this guy's cheating or i mean there's unless i'm not cool i'm gonna break any rules you know i'm just i'm doing everything in whether people like it or not i'm just gonna keep doing i think it's cool and i think shit

the air mass is

going up at night use it you know and that's what i'm doing and i've got uh luckily have uh the capability to do that so but you know when it you know with the with the record thing i don't know if there's nothing i mean if there's a record done i i know people need to start looking you know because claus oman i think he was he's he saw this nighttime stuff and i think he's starting to you know there's probably some some stuff that he's trying to work on because there was a i sold dennis tito's other arcus and uh i got a call from a guy down in argentina the guy was you know like uh i said what do you what do you want to do with the glider he goes we'll call someone he wants me to buy it so it's like you know i mean

you know what what he what he's doing over there over the mad and stuff is just so cool yeah

have you heard have you uh heard of baptiste innocent uh the french guy he's doing he was doing that stuff over the mad he did some big big flights um big triangle flights where he he launched from uh the alps and then crossed over to uh what was the island down there mad and then jumped yeah then jumped off uh downwind into croatia and then flew ridge and thermal left back i did i did hear about that

sorry i was i was confusing him with claus but yeah yeah i mean it's just it's it's remarkable you know it's just so cool that you know the Red Bull X-Alps it takes us 12 days to do that whole range and you guys do it in a day you know it's yeah but it's just awesome

no i think i think what you guys are that's pretty cool i'm just sitting putting my ass in the seat for 17 hours you guys are walking doing all this crap you know

yeah it's vicious it's vicious but it's it it's super inspiring i really appreciate what you're you know you're pressing into because it's uh it's new boundaries feels kind of apollo-ish man yeah i mean it feels it feels yeah yeah it feels that that you're you're opening new lines which is kind of what this thing's been about for a long time you know we're trying to find lines that are cool that are ascetic and that are yeah yeah that are pushing the boundaries one one one final question here just because you know we don't think like you do as pilots when it comes to landing because we can land anywhere i know that's not the case with sailplanes but it's do you do you get when you've flown as long as you have and you have the experience that you have does your threshold for safety keep dropping because you know you you're i've got the experience i could figure this out you know i'm going for this big distance or do you really just have to keep a really reasonable it sounds like you kind of the margin got a little soft there at the end of that lat you know the your big one but

yeah it it it does i think you have to know your own limits you know you know on that on that big flight could you know i could have just said well i don't want to get my 3 000 kilometers pushed right in the moisture and gone for alturas and probably probably not been talking to you right now you know but i think there's there's a point where you do get that limit and it's funny because that that flight i you you get to that point you know and everyone that's done these you know these big things

sometimes you get that point you go do i cross that line you know if i cross it i might be paying dearly for this you know is this worth it you know and you know and i think my experience in the military and in the airlines there's a safety aspect that you you put in there you go this is nothing's worth this you know it's just this is ridiculous i don't want to be the guy they go what was the guy that guy was an idiot what was he thinking you know so i i mean there's there's a certain you know i don't want to say i'm i'm i'm not reckless in fighting you know i'm not reckless by any means but i always i always have an out if as long as you have an out you know like okay well i can land at that field because menden's got too big of a crosswind i'll go downwind i'll land in hawthorne into the wind on the runway you know then then then that's a good you have to have those options you know you have to have those those alternatives and if you don't you don't have an out then it's kind of foolish flying it's it's just like flying a flying a glider and just

leaving an area of lift and going okay i'm going to go for that cloud and if i if there's no lift there there's no place to land i'm breaking the glider that to me that's foolish i just i never fly that way you know even if i have an engine because i don't rely on that engine to start it might not start so i i think i'm fairly safe in my thinking are you are you're definitely taking more risk you know doing that type of line that i'm then thermoflying because of the elements you're dealing with it's just that's just the nature of the beast you know it's just like climbing k2 versus you know some other some smaller figures just certain certain amounts of elements of risk you have to put up with you know but sure you know the safest possible way you can do it that's the way to do it so yeah we got to get you down here i think it'll uh i

gordon i'm coming man i i if if you're if you're if you're sincere about the offer just give me a shout i will uh i will come this has been amazing uh thank you for your time we've been incredibly entertaining and thank you sir and i'll be i'll be watching you and i can't wait to see what you do next thank you gavin thanks for your time appreciate it appreciate that nice talking to you

that's right that's right that's right that's right that's right that's right that's right that's right that's right that's right that's right that's right that's right you get your podcast. That goes a long ways and helps spread the word. You can blog about it on your own website or share it on social media. You can talk about it on the way out to launch with your pilot friends. I know a lot of interesting conversations have happened that way. And of course, you can support us financially. This show does take a lot of time, a lot of editing, a lot of storage and music and all kinds of behind the scenes costs. So if you can support us financially, all we've ever asked for is a buck a show. And you can do that through a one-time donation through PayPal, or you can set up a subscription service that charges you for each show that comes out. We put a new show out every two weeks. So for example, if you did a buck a show and every two weeks, it'd be about $25 a year.

So way cheaper than a magazine subscription. And it makes all of this possible. I do not want to fund this show with advertising or sponsors. We get asked about that pretty frequently, but for a whole bunch of different reasons, which I've said many times on the show, I don't want to do that. I don't like having that stuff at the front of the show. And I also want to do it for the people that are watching. I want you to know that these are authentic conversations with real people. And these are just our opinions, but our opinions are not being skewed by sponsors or advertising dollars. I think that's a pretty toxic business model. So I hope you dig that. You can support us. If you go to cloudbasedmayhem.com, you can find the places to support. You can do it through patreon.com forward slash cloud-based mayhem. If you want a recurring subscription, you can also do that directly through the website. We've tried to make it really easy and that will give you access to all the bonus material.

A little video cast that we do and extra little nuggets that we find in conversations that don't make it into the main show, but we feel like you should hear. We don't put any of that behind a paywall. If you can't afford to support us, then just let me know and I'll set you up with an account. Of course, that'll be lifetime and hopefully you're being in a position someday to be able to support us. But you'll find all that on the website. All of you who have supported us or even joined our newsletter or bought Cloud-Based Mayhem, merchandise, t-shirts or hats or anything, you should be all set up. You should have an account and you should be able to access all that bonus material now. Thank you so much for listening. I really appreciate your support and we'll see you on the next show. Thank you.

Bye.

Thank you.