Corkscrew overhead Hallig Hooge

Date	July 25, 2013	Type	SF25C
Origin	Uetersen	Origin ICAO	EDHE
Destination	Westerland	Destination ICAO	EDXW
Approx. distance	ca. 180 nm return	Flying time	02:37h

As my fellow glider pilot Robert wanted to surprise his wife, who was vacationing on the island of Sylt, the two of us grabbed the motor glider and set course for Germany's most popular island. This same popularity normally deters me from visiting Sylt, but its lively airport does make it a fun destination, as I found out on a few previous occasions.

Both the inbound and the outbound flight were quite interesting, mostly due to the weather. In the morning we ran into a 500 ft ceiling straight after takeoff and decided to play it safe by aborting and returning to the field. When we left the field in earnest on our second attempt, we found better viz, yet probably not much in excess of 8 km. However, after leaving the umbrella of EDDH C airspace, we managed to climb to 6300 ft, which afforded us with excellent views "on top".

The next challenge of course was "getting down" again. While we had seen large gaps in the cloud cover and had the ground in sight most of the time, by the time we got close to Sylt those gaps had shrunken significantly. We did manage to work our way down overhead Hallig Hooge in a nice corkscrew, making sure to keep land in sight rather than sea - so as not to get disorientied due to the lack of an AI. From there on we worked our way towards Sylt fairly low and entered the CTR via the Sierra routing for an uneventful landing on runway 32, following a Lufthansa CRJ.

After enjoying a nice lunch at Gosch and spending a relaxing afternoon at the beach, we headed back. The return flight was quite a bit easier, departing from runway 6 and via the Echo routing. We encountered great viz and a high ceiling overhead the mainland all the way up to the Kiel Canal, whereafter we were back in reduced viz with ca. 15 km. The landing at EDHE was unspectacular.

Westerland on the island of Sylt is an interesting airfield with increasing traffic also from the airlines. It has a long history and curiously is also used by gliders. Overall, in terms of hospitality, I would rate it below other airfields on German North Sea coast islands. E.g., there is no provision for renting bikes at the field, while other fields offer bikes for free! This fits with the general character of Sylt, which is quite "commercial" and in my view too crowded...

Before takeoff at apron 2 in Westerland

Map provided with friendly approval of SkyDemon. Click to zoom. Not to be used for navigation.