Cascade Soaring Society is a non-profit club providing our members with the opportunity to fully and safely enjoy the sport of soaring. As part of our mission, we seek to help others discover this thrilling and challenging sport. We fly out of Pangborn Field in East Wenatchee, Washington from March through October, mainly on weekends.
Cascade Soaring Society is one of the oldest glider clubs in Washington State. About a decade after WWII we relocated from Puget Sound to Fancher Field in Wenatchee. We presently make our home at Pangborn Memorial Airport in East Wenatchee, Washington.
We are student pilots, private pilots, commercial pilots, and FAA certified flight instructors. We teach young folks to fly, and the young at heart too - because we love to soar!
Cascade Soaring Society is located at one of the most spectacular soaring sites in the western United States (KEAT/Pangborn). The favorable geography, excellent weather, and wide open areas give a glider pilot just the right conditions to explore the excitement of the soaring sport to its fullest extent.
The Cascade Range to our west scrubs the Pacific air of most of its humidity, providing for superb thermal-forming conditions in Eastern Washington with cloud bases frequently above 10,000 feet.
The Columbia Basin near our headquarters is well known to glider pilots for “having it all”. Frequent westerly winds produce ridge lift near the airport. That ridge lift sustains training flights and permits transitions into thermals and mountain waves. Dust devils often mark thermals on the ridge, visible as we launch from the runway.
Those dust devils and cumulus clouds spread the over rolling hills to our east. Particularly in the spring, mountain waves appear, at times easily accessible from the ridge. For some of us, the most thrilling cross-country soaring is to the west, over the craggy peaks, winding valleys, and emerald lakes of the Cascades. On especially good lift days, when the cloud base is 12,000 feet, and the lift is booming, we stay up for hours.
We have three club-owned gliders and a "tug" Cessna in our fleet. Also, several of our members store and fly their own gliders with us!
Our mighty “tug” is a Cessna 150E/150 with a 150 hp engine (6:1)
