“The Retrieve” a crew’s perspective
The weather was not great as Allan described, however, Keith and I decided we needed some retail therapy so of course went to the hardware store. Our shopping was rudely interrupt by a text “Mike Codling” has outlanded, followed by a call from Charlie, Allan has outlanded Quick trip back to Dingo Base to find Brendan and Tobias had also outlanded. Hook three trailers up ready to go, Keith and Charlie have TomTom I have no idea of where to go. Luckily the club class guys were close together, so I was to follow Keith. The problem was I have not driven on the right hand side of the road for 30 years, so it was deep end instruction. Everything was going well until we struck torrential rain on windy narrow roads. Keith led the way and we found Mike and Allan and he went further on to get Brenden. Mike found a good spot to land, however, it had been ploughed recently and had just been rained on and the soil was just like the Darling Downs. A local bloke turned up, who spoke no English and when we explained by hand signal what we wanted to do he just shook his head. Towed the trailer into the paddock along tractor tracks and dropped the trailer off about 50 metres from the glider. So dismantled the glider and carried the bits to the trailer with the help of a local, Allan and Mike. The Skoda with care was able to get the trailer out of the paddock. By now we had an urgent SOS from Charlie that they were bogged and needed help. Before we left checked Allan’s aircraft which was parked in the middle of a wet stubble paddock, we would come back for it later.
So in convoy with Keith we went to Charlie’s assistance. I thought Mike’s paddock was bad, Tobias’ had just been ploughed and was very wet. Again the solution was to dismantle the aircraft and carry the bits to the trailer through even stickier mud. With all trailers now packed it was off to the airfield 2 hours away. Arrived home at about 10:30pm and had a meal. Allan’s glider was still in the paddock 2 hours away. Crew 179 (total of crew ages) had a short meeting and decided the pilots should go to bed while we went on the retrieve. The course was plotted in TomTom for the shortest distance which took Keith up mountain in first gear worrying what was at the end of the road.All turned out well and arrived at the paddock at 2:30pm and decided to drive the trailer to the glider, luckily did not get bogged. Packed the trailer and left for home at 3:00pm. Had a steady drive home Charlie snoring in the back and Keith riding shotgun. Arrived back at the field at 5:00pm, what an epic, left for the retrieve in daylight and arrived back home in the daylight next day.
Just as well crew are on salary, pilots could not afford the overtime.
So it was home to bed and pilots showed great consideration and said we could have the morning off, but be sure we were back for the landings.

From Graham