TERRY ASPINALL

PHOTO GALLERY

My very first top to bottom flight on a Hang Glider. I was flying a Birdman Albatross 180, from a small sand cliff at Sizewell in Suffolk UK. Waiting for me on the beach is friend and teacher David Cook. Taken on a beautiful day some time in 1974 with a near perfect north easterly wind blowing around 18mph

 

The Minsmere to Dunwich cliffs, a beautiful site to fly. Even though David Cook and his VJ23 had been soaring this cliff site since 1973 it took a couple more years before weight shift Hang Gliders had improved in their design, before I became the first person to make the first soaring flight from one end to the other. Taking off from Dunwich which is at the top end of the photo. That day I completed the trip 6 times before landing. Its also worth noting that the Minsmere end of the cliffs were inside of the Minsmere Bird Reserve and that David had negotiated a special deal to fly from there. It must also be remembered that when he made those arrangements he was in fact the only person flying in that area. All his friends respected that and we never flew from Minsmere so we endangered his special deal

 

This is a very famous photo

Taken at one of the early British Hang Gliding Championships held a Mere.

The guy holding the Hang Glider nose is Bill Moyes, as his son Steven prepares to take off. Behind the Glider is a member of the Kiwi team, and he is abusing Bill about the two pieces of string that are hanging from the trailing edge of the Hang Gliders sail. Bill is answering him back explaining that it allows then to control the sail during flying and thus placed them into a different category of Gliders (I believe category three). To david and I, it was a big joke because Bill had cut the string from a bale of straw in the landing area, and wasn't as hi-teck as he was claiming to the Kiwi. At one time it got quite heated and if Bill had not of released his son so he could take off, it might have got quite ugly. Mind you where ever Bill and Steven turned up during the weekend it just so happened that the Kiwi was also there continuing with his taunts. It has to be said that at that meeting, Steven won just about every thing he entered and was an exceptional flyer.

 

Another Famous photo

I was lucky to be living in Brisbane Australia when Brian Milton's Shadow was displayed during the Expo88 Show, May to October1988. That's Emily my wife and myself standing in front of the cockpit