On 8/10/2010 12:59 AM, brianDG303 wrote:
On Aug 9, 9:05 pm, Mike
wrote:
On 8/9/2010 9:19 PM, brian whatcott wrote:

On 8/9/2010 5:07 PM, flyingmr2 wrote:
/snip/ Please, everyone stay safe and no
more crashing! If we have another fatality in the west anytime soon,
my wife might pull the plug on her support for this hobby./snip/
Please fly
safe!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

One way to fly safe - er, is to avoid being in the vicinity of other
aircraft. Easy for me to say! That might mean no contests?

Brian W

Given the current turmoil with ADS-B vs. Powerflarm, etc....the smartest
investment might not be any avionics at all, but a ballistic recovery chute.

--
Mike Schumann

Mike,
with respect, it seems that you are quite fixated on ADS-B and the way
FLARM was (not) introduced to the US, and that you respond to every
post with that filter. I don't see the turmoil; I have a transponder,
so if you have powerflarm you will see me. If you have ADS-B, flarm,
or powerflarm I will see you, because I am going to have a powerflarm
ASAP. So you have flarm or powerflarm you will see me again. If power
traffic is a threat I will see it (their transponder). If they have
ATC following, or TCAS they will see my transponder.

The turmoil, is it that the exact form of what we will be using in 10
years is not clear? That seems a separate subject. And the ballistic
chute, like that Cirrus had that went through the tow plane, I recall
they burned on the way down, not a fun ride. It's speculation, but if
you project that into next year, and that glider on tow had powerflarm
it (in theory) would have alerted the glider to the incoming cirrus
when it alerted to the transponder and that could have made the
difference.

Any way you slice it the $1,600 seems like cheap insurance to me.

Brian

There are a lot of people drinking the PowerFlarm koolaid. PowerFlarm
will not see everyone. In remote areas, where there are no ADS-B ground
stations and transponders are not interrogated by radar systems,
PowerFlarm will not see other aircraft that are equipped with
conventional transponders or ADS-B UAT transponders.

I'm not pushing any particular technology. My only point is that the
cornerstone of an effective collision avoidance strategy is to have
everyone utilize a single common technology.

Ten years ago that could have been FLARM, ADS-B UAT, or ....... What we
have now is a huge mess, where the FAA is pushing two flavors of ADS-B,
which can't see each other in remote low altitude environments, and now
the glider community is going off on their own with FLARM.

Maybe this will all shake out over the next ten years and everyone will
end up gravitating to one of these technologies. On the other hand, we
could also end up with ten more years of the current mayhem and fatal
accidents.

--
Mike Schumann