Day 5- Wednesday 15 July. Landout Day.

It's 8am. Abi's alarm goes off. It signals the start of the first declared task of the day. Task week co-ordinator Kevin Houlihan has proposed a stealthy repositioning of Gary's DG100, and Abi meets David and Rick outside to commence the mission. The original plan entails pushing the glider to the opposite end of the runway, but after 30m the boys are wearing. The hangar is conveniently open (thanks Jay!), and David pushes the retrieve quad out to the glider to minimise noise levels and avoid waking the brute (not that this was to be a problem... he'd sleep through a nuclear attack). We return to Jay's al fresco breakfast bar, and wait with bated breath for Gary to emerge and start panicking about his lost baby. No such luck! The brute gets up, gets dressed, has a wander, then drives off, without saying a word. The Dubliners arrive, and Kevin nods approval at the completion of the task. The brute returns, but still, nothing! Post-briefing, Owen exits to dry the dew off the Discus' wings, and with an Oscar-worthy performance comments casually to Gary, 'where's your glider Brute?!' The brute looks up at the empty space that his glider once occupied, and Owen is right, there's no sign! Gary shows little concern, asking Owen if he's seen his sunglasses or his camera, and retiring to his tent. The first retrieve of the day is on the cards, when Gary eventually monitors away at the field and finds the 100 and brings her back to the launch point. The real task is to begin! Durrow-Thurles-Birr, 120km.

Rick is the first off the grid, with a 1500' launch into a steady 1.5 up. Stuart, Gary, Owen, Jay, Kevin and David follow on, and Kevin is the first to call start on the task. Onlookers on the ground look up nervously at the circling K-13, pleased to see it within soaring distance of the airfield after David 'land-out' Lisk had been threatening to attempt the 'ambitious' task. This is one aircraft we don't want to be retrieving with its debateably serviceable trailer! Owen lands back having abandoned the task, but makes sure he hits a cone on landing, in case Kevin deals out further points after his incident yesterday. Maybe we won't be retrieving all might after all! But then, the phone starts ringing. They're dropping like flies! Jay is first down, and Owen and Bob quickly volunteer to get on and retrieve him. A few minutes later and Rick's on the phone, down in a field a few miles to the south. The K-13 hasn't been seen in the Birr vicinity for hours, and we all wait in nervous anticipation for the next call. There are still three men in the air after Stuart returns to Birr, though there's no worry that we might have to retrieve Kevin with his untouchable piloting skill (oh, and that engine...)! Only Gary and David to be worried about then. Then... A new concept! Rick appears on the airfield, minus a glider! The kindly farmer he took upon himself to visit has brought him back, and he informs us he is 'self-retrieving'. With some help of course! Walt and Abi volunteer themselves, and then the dreaded call comes... Abi's phone was earlier lost somewhere on the field, so the call had to come through several channels before reaching the club. After several unanswered calls to Abi, David called Owen on the radio and asked him to relay the message to the club. Walt is the one to bear the bad news to Abi, the anxious retrieve co-ordinator. David is told that he's last on the retrieving list, being SW of Durrow and 50km away, and we would be with him in several hours.

And so, off to get Rick's ASW20. Even on the self-retrieve, Rick has impressively forgotten where his field is, so the 5km journey ends up being more of a 10km one, with some excellent trailer-towing three-point-turning. Rick attempts to explain that his field selection might initially appear to be puzzling, due to the two enormous and beautiful fields we have to drive through to get to the glider. However, he assures us that from the air, his choice seemed the best at the time. De-rigging is stress free, though quite slow as Rick gets repeatedly distracted by booming cumulus and perfect cloud streets passing overhead, wondering how he managed to get the glider on the ground in these conditions... Half an hour later we're back on the road, pondering whether to get some food before retrieving David. We get back to the clubhouse but the water has once again stopped running, and we can't foresee any cooking, so Abi and Rick start to round up the troops, and recruit Matthew, Peter and Gary. Just as we are about to head off, Seamus Cashin volunteers himself, claiming we can turn off the sat-navs and abandon the maps, as 'I know this place like the back of me hand- I'm from Tipperary!'. Seamus jumps in the front seat with Rick who is towing the dubious trailer and starts his expert navigation, which Rick quickly becomes sceptical of when Seamus sends him 540 degrees around a roundabout, with a confused Gary following behind. Having learned on Sunday that Seamus tells a good story, Rick tries codjoling some more information out of him, but ends up only hearing the same stories again, and then gets a heritage trail of Offaly, Tipperary and Laois- castles galore!

We somehow make it through Durrow with Seamus' navigation, and start to monitor away at the fields around. Seamus spots a woman standing on the corner of a country road, and we pull over to ask directions to the Toberboe road. She points up the hill, and while Seamus attempts to get rid of Abi by giving her up to the woman's son as a country wife, and gives her bingo tips, Rick spots the glowing k13 on the hillside about a mile away. Gary shoots on, as Gary does, and Rick trundled on towards the yellow bird. Somehow, Rick makes it first, surprised when Gary is nowhere to be seen. Even more surprising is David's field, which is three times the size of Birr airfield... He chose a downwind landing, but it was hardly a problem in Heathrow airport. Gary arrives ten minutes later, having taken a bit of a detour. As we all complain of being starving hungry, David boasts about the hospitality of the farmer and the stonking feed he'd just had. At the bottom of the field are 15 cars and a gathering Wednesday mass, which starts to disperse when the de-rigging commences. Suddenly we are surrounded by a swarm of onlookers, all of whom seem to be Seamus' long lost buddies, and he attempts to avoid lifting the fuselage onto the trailer. Whilst Abi struggles to lift the back of the fuselage alone, we suddenly realise that David Lisk is also neglecting his duties, and chatting away with the spectators.

Suddenly, a wee Irish boy trots over. He's about ten years old, innocent, red haired, nothing to suspect. 'Is dis ting made in Germany?' he said, out of nowhere.
'How did you know that?' said a shocked David. Silence. The leprechaun ignores David.
'He's psychic you know!' says his sister, lingering behind. David stares at them, open mouthed, as they walk away.




David, a little on edge, comes round, and starts to help with the lifting. Yellow K-13 is padded in and stable on the trailer in a fairly impressive time frame, although there's a little concern over the security of the tailplane, which had been damaged on the journey down. However, David is confident in the strength of the corrugated paper, so we get going. Rick drives cautiously, stopping to check the trailer every few miles, regardless of holding up country traffic. David Lisk responsibly adheres to airfield law and wears his high-vis jacket throughout the operation, and was pleased to report no damage.

All is going smoothly, and Rick observes Abi's excellent navigation, but then swiftly takes it back when we reach a roundabout where none of the options seem attractive. We've done it again! Chatting away, we're suddenly heading for Cork for the second time in three days! Fortunately the next roundabout sends us all the way round with a direction for Birr, and we're back on track.