Bird Story

I left out the coolest bird story from the first day of this meet.  I was racing hard with Jonny on the second leg of the task when we got in a rough spot north of Mt Jack.  He went deep and I searched on the shoulder further North.  There was some strong turb but I couldn’t quite find the lift.  My concentration was broken by a loud shriek.  I looked around but there was nothing.  I thought it was my imagination.  But again, a loud shriek.  The second time it didn’t stop.  It just continued, right in my ear.  I craned my neck around and saw that just off my trailing edge was a very lare Wedge Tailed Eagle Talons out and very pissed.  He was taking up the space between the end of my keep and the trailing edge!  CRAAAAAAWK!   I obviously couldn’t outrun him so I just tried to circle for some lift and pray that he didn’t take a chunk out of my sail.  I have heard many stories from pilots about Wedgies attacking their gliders and putting small tears in the leading edges or tips.  I was lucky because this guy just wanted to issue a warning.  It must have been pretty funny for the other guys to watch this bird chasing me around while I ran hopelessly.

 

Kev