Yes, safety is very important, but it's not a black art. If a student pilot
can be taught winch launch in 20 or so flights, a rated pilot can be taught
in less. There's no reason that a good pilot shouldn't be able to
concentrate on a launch for 30 - 40- seconds. The envelope is narrow but
not extremely so. Don't overstate the case.

Bill Daniels


"Dan G" wrote in message
ups.com...
On Aug 15, 11:21 pm, Chris Reed wrote:
A number of the current threads talk about winching in the US. As this
is fairly new to the US, and old hat in Europe, it might be useful for
European readers to offer tips to US clubs who are thinking of trying it.

My tip would to be concentrate on safety. It is of utmost importance
that a glider can also recover from a launch failure no matter when
during the launch it occurs. That sounds simple but in reality it's
quite complex: it mandates that the glider is flown in a very precise
and quite narrow envelope during the launch, particularly the first
part, and what you actually do in the event of a failure is totally
dependent on the layout of the airfield and wind speed and direction.
You need very experienced people to teach you what to do.

The BGA has produced excellent safety advice, read it he

http://www.gliding.co.uk/bgainfo/doc...hlaunching.pdf

However, if you don't follow that advice, this is what happens:

http://www.aaib.gov.uk/cms_resources...54%2008-07.pdf


Dan