Outdoor Free Flight

The 2019 Outdoor Free Flight Nats were held August 5-9 at the International Aeromodeling Center in Muncie, Indiana. See all the highlights of this year’s event and final results with our NatsNews 2019 Outdoor Free Flight edition.

NatsNews: Outdoor Free Flight

By Rick Pangell (themaxout@aol.com)

Sitting in the motel “breakfast room,” with my eyes hardly open, a voice came out of the hallway … “Did you guys go to the Dawn Unlimited event?” Apparently, I did not, so there are no photos of that happening.

Gerald Brown put in an early morning flight of just over 6 minutes, with Robert Marier just 30 seconds behind. Dan Berry and Chuck Powell were respectively 3rd and 4th. It was Chuck Powell who found me in the breakfast room and asked.

By Rick Pangell (themaxout@aol.com)

One word to describe the day: windy! Well maybe another for the last part: stormy.

By Rick Pangell (themaxout@aol.com)

Waking up and not being able to see across the street from my motel room made me want to just toss the covers back over my head. But, having a cup of coffee and driving to the field made a world of difference.

It was dead flat and no rain! Everyone had basically gathered up on the knoll just west of the Control Line circles. The Catapult pen was set up on the hill just east of there.

By Rick Pangell (themaxout@aol.com)

The morning started out with some “iffy” weather, and choosing a launch line for the F1 events was being debated. F1C and F1Q were sharing the same starting positions but the issue wasn’t that, it was the prevailing wind direction. F1H was on its own but piggybacked on the big model location. The first round was delayed until it got straightened out and a suitable place was found. The wind blew southwest to northeast, so much of the flying came from the southwest corner of the complex.

By Rick Pangell (themaxout@aol.com)

I guess that when you come to the Nats, there is a growing anticipation of energy in the crowd. Plus, it’s an excitement that comes from seeing all of the “usual suspects” of fellow fliers from last year. And then seeing the new fliers come into the ranks, and this is their first Nats and they make great showing.

By Don DeLoach

The Free Flight Nationals are back August 5-9... for (can you believe it?) the 93rd running.

We will fly 71(!) events this week, plus several ad-hoc evening and morning “fun” events. There were about 145 preregistered fliers as of Sunday, August 4—an excellent turnout. The weather forecast looks very promising for the week with only a couple chances for rain in the middle of the week.