From the Executive Officer, Terry Cubley AM, all the latest developmenta at the GFA
AGM outcomes
The management of Gliding Australia has undergone significant change as set out in the Annual General Meeting held via Zoom on 20 September. Some 55 members attended the meeting, and 109 others submitted proxy votes.
President Steve Pegler introduced our newly appointed CEO, Mr Douglas Flockhart, who is from Brisbane.
He also introduced our new Executive Manager Operations (EMO) Dave Boulter. Dave is an L3 instructor from Sydney, and is the CFI at Southern Cross.
Three Board members have stepped down as their tenure has come to an end – Lindsay Mitchell, Jenny Thompson and Pat Barfield. We thank each of them for their major contribution to Gliding Australia. See the list of awards in this magazine to see some of their achievements.
Terry Cubley’s position as Executive Officer (EO) has been superseded by the appointment of the CEO so he leaves his role after 10 years working for Gliding Australia.
New Executive members have taken over responsibility to guide Gliding Australia. Craig Vinall from Adelaide is now Chair of Soaring Development, and Aaron Stroop from Melbourne takes over as Chair of Operations. The role of Vice President is also no longer part of our structure so Lindsay Mitchell has stepped down after many years in a range of roles.
Regional Board members have primarily retained their roles except that in Victoria Bev Alden and Vivienne Drew have take over from Duncan Robertson.
Change to the Gliding Australia financial year
The major focus of the meeting was a change to the constitution to allow a change to our financial year.
Previously, the financial year ran from 1 May through to 30 April, but the Board had struggled for quite some time when setting the Strategic Plan, as the preparation would take place in March and April when the soaring season was still in full swing. The Board recommended that it be changed to run from 1 September through to the end of August instead. The voting members agreed with this suggestion and passed the motion to change the constitution.
This finalised the constitution changes approved last year, with the major changes being the appointment of a CEO, creation of a Chair of the Board, and separation of the Board and Executive. Members are not expected to see much difference in the activity of the Board and Executive, but it will ensure clear focus and separation of policy and implementation roles.
Financial outcomes
Our finances continue to improve under the guidance of Treasurer Chris Bowman.
At the end of our financial year Gliding Australia remains in a sound financial position with net assets of $2.431M. Of these assets $591k are reserves held for the RANGA junior scholarship fund ($39k), the Soaring Development Fund ($542k) and the Training Manual Project ($10k). Gliding Australia assists Clubs with the financing of gliders. At present Caboolture, North Qld, Hunter Valley and Alice Springs clubs have loans with the Gliding Australia. Income was lower than last year, primarily impacted by a loss on investment of $83k. Bottom line was a surplus of $67k.
Gliding Australia Staff
As this is my last report, I would like to commend the work of Tanya, Fiona and Carol in our office. I regularly hear great reports from members about the service and support that they provide. Remember that they are available 4 days per week and every second Friday, but if you email them at returns@ gliding Australia.org they will get back to you quickly.
I also want to thank Dennis (Airworthiness), Sharon (Just Go) and Ian (Salesforce), all excellent at providing technical support to members. We are very lucky to have their skills.
Flarm
Steve Trone continues to do a lot of work to support Flarm use. He has installed a large number of Open Glider network bases which take the signal from your Flarm and display the position of all received gliders on the network. I use Glide and Seek software to display the tracks, but a few different programs are available. Steve has now created a display for each gliding site which shows gliders from the site who are visible on OGN and gives data on the performance of each of the Flarms. It is good to see how other gliders at your site are supporting your safety by displaying their location, and how useful the Flarms are at alerting other aircraft.
If your Flarm is showing version 7.21 then you are up to date. Version 7.07 expires in late 2023. Updating your Flarm software is part of your annual inspection requirement.
You can measure the actual performance of your Flarm by downloading a trace from your Flarm and running it through Flarm Range Analyser. This can be very revealing.
World Championships at Narromine November/December 2023
Australia is hosting another world championships, on this occasion for Club, Standard and 15m Classes. Once again, Narromine has offered to host the event and a large team of volunteers are already working hard. Mike Durrant is the CD and is doing a great job of rallying the large number of helpers to ensure a successful event. Have a look at the competition website at https://wgc2023.com.au/, where a lot of information is already available.
Australia has six top pilots competing, all with excellent experiences at Narromine.
E5Glide Championships in France
This championship has just concluded and Australian pilot Matthew Scutter has once again won the event, flying an LS8e 15m glider. Matthew won two years ago and was second at last year’s competition. He obviously has talent in this format and is quickly developing skills in the French Alps. Matthew. Featuring electric-powered gliders, the event allows pilots to use their engines during the task to improve their result, but places a limit on how much power can be used before penalties apply.
