Jack

I started flying (stiff wing) in late 30's and experienced
intermittent nausea for many hours. While all of my experience has
been in powered aircraft, I can offer some suggestions from my decades
of flying.

In no particular order:

1. Keep cockpit COLD as possible.
2. Direct as much airstream as possible on face.
3. Dress to stay cool.
4. You fly the aircraft (minimum passenger time).
5. Stay busy flying bird (no time to get sick).
6. Make sweeping gentle maneuvers. You may fall out of a thermal but
that is price of getting body acclimated.
7. I don't have the data at hand any more but watch what you eat,
no hot spicy, amount and how close to flight time. May find some
info on Google? Sucking on some peppermint Life Savers sometimes
helps. Chew gum.
8.Have ur ears checked. ENT Doc might determine an anomaly he can
fix. Check inner ear on Google for history of nausea. Check NASA
for what they do/recommend for nausea. What do they do in their
zero"G" trainer aircraft.
9. Sched ur flights in early morning when air is cool and minimum
thermals to bump you around. Know this is not best glider time but
you are trying to get over ur air sickness problem. Stay out of
rough air as aggravates air sickness.
10. Carry a kit with you:
Zip Lock bags to catch barf. Will keep you clean and remove
smell from cockpit. Use instead of diving back to
land.
Wet wipes to clean face and lips after barfing. Store in a Zip
Lock after using.
Possibly small bottle of mouth wash to remove taste from
mouth.
11. AND. Years ago, before TV and Internet, we had a game we played.
We would take a broom and hold bristles against our chest and
spin around as fast as possible looking up handle for 10-20 times
in evening on the grass when stars came out. We then would throw
broom on ground and try to jump over it. Was impossible to do as
you always seemed to jump 90 degrees from direction you wanted to
go. You might try this 'game' every day to give ur body the
exposure to the inner ear vs eye sight difference which you
experience in flight and is the root cause of nausea.

All of these recommendations are little or no cost except for the Doc
visit.

Hope perseverance pays off for you and you can start enjoying your
flying.

Big John
Older than mud )

My list of actions is not all inclusive. Many other things have been
suggested to you and can also be tried.
************************************************** *****************

On Sun, 9 Nov 2008 18:10:01 +1100, "Jack" None wrote:

I am learning to fly gliders and I struggle with motion sickness.

I have tried:
- Ginder tablets, it helped but I was still a bit nauseaus.
- Motion sickness tablets, they affect my awareness and concentration.
- Chewing various things, best was beef jerky (not a joke) it helps but
still not good enough.

Today in a lesson we had very good conditions, for the first time I was able
to really play and experiment with the glider without stress or time
constraints, various banks in thermals, near stalls, trim various speeds
etc... I was able to get back to thermals to go back to 4-5000ft, I had all
these thing I was planning on learning/improving and today was the perfect
day for it but after 30 min the instructor tried to show me how to thermal
with a high bank and in 2 spins I started to feel bad, I took the controls
again but 1 minute later I was sweating, my focus and concentration were
gone. We had to waste 5000ft gliding straight down with brakes out.

My disapointment was huge, I was upset with myself and questioned if I
should have stayed and fought it but with hindsight I feel we did the right
thing to land.

I understand that I will probably get used to it but from a learning point
of view only doing short flights will slow down my progression and from a
financial point of view, well a 15min or 1 hour flight cost the same...

I have seen some adds about wristbands that look like a watch, they
electrically stimulate the median nerve and are supposed to prevent motion
sickness, since they do not have any side effects and the intensity is
adjustable it seems to be the ideal solution for me, I can gradually lower
the intensity until I am used to it.

Now the question, "do they really work ?" they are not cheap, about the cost
of 4 x 3000ft tow so I would appreciate if someone who used them can
comment.

Cheers
Jack