Work is progressing on getting the Sandhill Farm Open Glider Network (OGN) ground station operational. Yesterday, Mark (that’s me!) installed our PoE switch in the clubhouse and ran a direct burial Ethernet cable out to the main hangar. We plan to position the antennas for the system on a mast mounted at the front of this hangar, and tests yesterday indicate we should get good line-of-sight across the whole airfield from this position. Once the system’s up and running, we should be able to log take-offs and landings for aircraft equipped with FLARM devices automatically in our gliding app. There has historically been a gap in OGN coverage around Swindon, which this ground station should remedy, adding to general aviation safety (as well as providing flight traces automatically for the duration of flights from Sandhill Farm). Thanks to some generous assistance from the Cambridge Gliding Club CFI (Paul), we’ll also provide coverage for ADS-B and PilotAware from the same system.

We also had another beautiful winter flying day at the gliding centre yesterday – thanks to Peter for flying the tug, and to Al for instructing. It was just above freezing all day, and with the sun low at this time of year, and canopies prone to misting up very quickly when it’s this cold, we prefer runway 04 for less sun glare – provided there’s no tailwind.