Ramy wrote:
You could get 200 US glider pilots to chip in $500 on something that
won't increase their L/D? You must be quite a salesman 8^)


I for one, will be more than happy to chip in $500 for something that
will significantly increase safety. Most of us spend up to about $1000
on parachutes which we probably never use, so why not a Flarm like
device? I hope someone will either license the Flarm or produce
something similar, and then make it mandatory... Till then we will
continue average at least one mid air per year in the US...

I gave a short presentation on FLARM at the 2005 SSA convention, and
have tried to generate some interest in it. Very few people have had any
interest in it, unlike the huge response in Europe. I think the
difference is we don't have nearly the mid-air collision problem that
they do in the Alps, Pyrenees, and other places. Their airspace can be
far denser with gliders than ours, even including the White mountains
and the ridge-runners along the Alleghenies, and as a result, they run
into each other more frequently.

The poor response I get may be reasonable: personally, I think a
transponder is a better value at, say, $2000, than FLARM at $620Euro
(US$745). My experience is the glider that is likely to run into me is
the one I'm thermalling with and already know about. Except for
contests, I see more airplanes en route than gliders.

Even so, I hope people will pursue it. There are mitigating features;
for example, the FLARM will log a flight in IGC format, though it's not
secure at this point. If that happened, it wouldn't cost much more than
just an IGC logger. Busy clubs could benefit from it's use with a ground
station and automatic logging of tows and club glider use by it's
members, and there are other applications under way.

Besides technical people, I think we need some good lawyers that can
analyze the liability situation, then create a means to license or
otherwise acquire the technology from FLARM that would ease the concerns
of the FLARM developers.

I'd be willing to chip in at least $200 for starters.

--
Change "netto" to "net" to email me directly

Eric Greenwell
Washington State
USA

www.motorglider.org