On 7 Feb 2005 15:10:10 -0800, (Mark James Boyd)
wrote:

29 fatalities.

7 ridge
4 off-airport landings
4 spin on final
3 intentional aerobatics
3 did a PCC but not an assembly check
2 drugs
2 midair
1 rope break
1 on top of rotor clouds
1 fuel exhaustion takeoff eng fail
1 trim failure, killed the towpilot

Those statistics is absolutely worthless, I'm sorry to say.

If you want to find a connection between L/D and danger, it's
necessary to compare identical missions. A 2-33 that is limited to
flying traffic circuits is unlikely to hit a ridge or be damaged in an
off-airport landing during a competitition, don't you agree?

Fuel exhaustion is very unlikely to occur if your glider does not have
an engine - and gliders with engines are usually 45:1 plus. Another
case where a low.-performance glider has no chance to enter the crash
statistics.


Training gliders are per se safer than high performance gliders -
because the latter fly the more risky missions, e.g. cross-country.

One must not compare raw numbers - I bet even in the US there's at
least half a dozen glass gliders on every low-performance glider
("with a Vne less than 120 knots") that are flying cross-country.

Of coure accident numbers will be half a dozen times higher - but
accident rate per glider will be identical.


From some best guessing and the reports, over 80% of the
fatal accidents had PICs with over 100 hours in gliders. About half of the
pilots were CFIs or ATPs with hundreds of hours, often in make/model.

So I used the ASW-20 as my example. If I'd used the ASW-24E or
ASW-27B or Jantar 42-2 or PIK-30 or SZD 55-1, I'm sure
pilots would have come to defend these aircraft as well.

I may use the ASW-20 for an example of my own.
We had one in my club for 17 years.
During this time, we had about 20 aircraft damages (fortunately only
one guy was hurt), and NONE in the ASW-20.

Clear case - the 20 was by far the safest glider in our fleet. Its
replacement, the ASW-27, still hasn't suffererd any damage yet either.
Conclusion: The higher the L/D and the more handles in the cockpit,
the safer the glider.

I guess you see the dangers of reading statistics...


My point is that if I had to guess the next fatality, it would be
an experienced soaring pilot in a 43:1 ship low near a ridge
in a gaggle.

Yup.
Because all the low-performance gliders will bei either on the ground
or staying in the traffic circuit and therefore cannot take part your
scenario.


From a public safety standpoint, I think the FAA has done its
job. And I'll keep training pilots in the 2-33 and L-13 and
1-26 and PW-2. And some of them will move up to fast glass and
practice to try to maintain a level of safety. Hey, man,
that really is their own personal choice, as far as I'm concerned.

"Fast glass"... lmao.

Sorry Mark, but up in the air I like to go as fast as possible with as
much L/D as possible. The approach speed of a "fast glass" glider is
the same 50-55 kts as the one of any other low performance glider, and
its airbrakes are as effective.
It's an urban legend that an LS-4 is harder to fly than a Ka-8. Here
in Europe many clubs are using fast glass gliders as first solo
gliders, with convincing success.




Bye
Andreas