The annual safety meeting is scheduled for Saturday, April 6, from 9 am until noon, in the Springfield airport terminal building and online. We will send out an invitation with a link. The plan is to have lunch and then assemble a couple club gliders after the meeting. If the weather cooperates, we will begin conducting currency flights.

Greeting, NESA folks!

The annual meeting was this past Sunday, January 21, at the Crown Point Pub in Springfield. Almost 50 club members and guests attended, enjoying a social hour, buffet dinner, and member meeting. The meeting minutes will be posted to the club website after they are approved at the next board meeting.

Jim gave the President’s report, noting that the club welcomed seven new members in 2023, and thanked the twelve club members that either towed, instructed, or both. Jerry Smith presented the Treasurer’s report on a very successful year. A brief slideshow on the 2023 year in review was followed by the annual awards presentation. Winners were:

Uplift Award: Ava Saemann (presented by last year’s winner, Jim Malecha)

Cross-Country Award: Pieter Schwarzenbach (presented by Bob Morehardt)

First Solo Award: Ava Saemann

President’s Award: Jerry Smith

The club members present constituted a quorum, and voted in favor of the ballot of club officers and directors:

President: Jim Malecha

Vice President: Larry Perry

Secretary: Andy Kozak

Treasurer: Jerry Smith

Directors: Bill Batesole and Dave Carton (Steve Hurd and John Watkins begin their second year of a two-year term)

The attendees voted on monthly member meetings. They will be on the last Saturday of each month, April thru October. The meetings will be at 10 am, except for May and August, which will be a 4 pm picnic, provided volunteers organize those two events. Keep an eye on this space and your email for details as those dates approach.

Fundraising was discussed. T-shirts are available in yellow, orange or gray (sizes S thru XL) and polo shirts may be available, if there is adequate interest. Club members, watch your email for details.

The other club officers and I are looking forward to the upcoming season.

Thanks, and hope to see you out there!

JiM

Saturday, October 28th is the big day and the weather looks excellent!

As we now close into the end of our soaring season, the sailplanes need a wash before hibernation. Starting at 10am we will get all the gliders clean followed by a burger/dog lunch. After our bellies are full, we will start the spot landing contest.

Spot landing is closest to the touchdown point (not before but beyond) and stopping closest to the stopping cone. The Grand Prize will be a free 2500’ tow. Second place a SSA bucket hat and third place you get to drive the golf cart.

Cost of spot landing flight is a pattern tow, but no flight (glider use) fee. Pre-solo students can compete with CFIG on board.

During the day, a clean 2-33 will be available for flight instruction.

Come one, come all and show off your washing, eating and precision flying skills!

Colby VonKannewurff earned his private pilot certificate today, completing a checkride with NESA member Daryl Smith in a Connecticut Soaring 2-33 at Windham airport, down in CT. Alasdair Crawford was the recommending instructor. Most of you know Colby as a NESA fixture at KVSF for the past several years. He just started his freshman year at UConn. Way to go, Colby!

The October Member Meeting is scheduled for the 28th and is the final meeting of the soaring season. We will wash the gliders, have a spot landing contest (Contest Rules), and grill burgers. This month the meeting will have a rain date of Sunday the 29th, as we want to get the ships cleaned before they go into their trailers for the winter.

Additionally, if we are able to fly into November, Sunday the 19th will be our last day, again assuming the weather cooperates.

We have up to 7 more weekends of flying. Hope to see you out there!

Please remember the monthly member meeting is Saturday, September 30 at 10 am. We will have a brief recap of the Board meeting scheduled for later this week and answer any question you may have. We will not grill so we can get folks in the air earlier in the day.

Hope to see you out there!

Eight members attended the meeting this morning. We discussed the current scheduling system in an effort to ensure the instructor on duty can adequately cover the students signed up for the day. We also talked about the need for adequate ground ops personnel to run wings, etc. We grilled burgers at the end of the meeting, then club members took a dozen tows with Bill towing and Jerry instructing.

Tomorrow looks promising for flying. Hope to see you out there!

In one of the most reliable ways of ensuring rain next Saturday, NESA is planning to hold our monthly member meeting. The meeting will begin at 10 am. We will have a brief discussion, fire up the grill for burgers, then go fly.

Hope to see you out there!

After a great weekend of flying and instruction, here’s a reminder that the member meeting is this Saturday, July 29 at 10 a.m. This month we will not get the grill going – hopefully the weather will cooperate, and we will be able to start flying a little earlier in the day.

Hope to see you out there!

Springfield is hosting the Green Mountain Aerobatic Contest this weekend. There are several NOTAMs relating to that contest this weekend for KVSF. They include:

Aerobatic aircraft within an area 1 NM radius of KVSF from the surface to 4500 feet AGL

Runway 11 right traffic

Runway 23 right traffic

Please check NOTAMs prior to flight in case there are others. Thank you, Brian, for pointing these out!

Hope to see you out there!