On Jun 26, 9:46*am, BobW wrote:
Apologies for not trimming; just thought maintaining continuity of idea-flow
made sense here...

Bob W.
- - - - - -

On 6/26/2012 12:21 AM, Ramy wrote:









On Monday, June 25, 2012 8:38:39 PM UTC-7, Bill D wrote:
On Jun 25, 6:38 pm, Ramy wrote:
On Monday, June 25, 2012 12:06:23 PM UTC-7, Bill D wrote:
The most poisonous attitude that I fear are the people resistant to
change. *They can resist for the sake of resistance and meanwhile
poison the environment for everyone. *Adoption of Flarm or
Transponders or Radio usage or safety practices can all be very
detrimentally affected by a loud naysayer, even when the arguments
lack validity.

Everyone just needs to keep trying and start with focusing on your
own behaviors. *Your personal safety culture as you pointed out.

No kiddin'!

The safety of the sport of soaring for any particular pilot is only
as safe as he/she chooses to make his/her next flight.

Apparently it is not working this way. Otherwise accidents would have
happened only to unsafe pilots, but the statistics is showing
otherwise. Problem is that most pilots are not aware that they are
doing something unsafe. Most pilots are not aware of the many different
ways they can kill themselves, since we do not have an effective system
to learn from accidents and incidents and figure out ways to prevent
them from happening again, as oppose to commercial aviation which
constantly learn from every accident as much as possible and implement
lessons, resulting in contiguous improved safety. Our safet record not
only not improving, but getting worse. Last year was a record year for
fatalities, and this year we would have already broke this record if
not for some amazing luck. And it is only the beginning of the season..
Almost every fatality I heard of since I started flying many years ago
had no useful information or conclusion other than speculation on RAS
and the typical useless NTSB report. Those who knows the details, and
those who survives the crashes, usually prefer to keep the details for
themselves. Until we manage to implement such a system, pilots will
continue killing themselves without realizing they are not as safe as
they choose to be.

Ramy

It works like this. Fact: There was a crash. Uninformed speculation: The
pilot was 'safe' so there must be an outside cause.

I've discussed this with Greg Feith, a retired NTSB investigator
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greg_Feith). *Feith says we're naturally
uncomfortable with pilot error since "they were one of us". *NTSB reports
aren't useless just because they fail to list evidence the pilot was at
fault - the investigation stops when it's obvious the cause was pilot
error but the final report will stop short of calling a recently departed
pilot an idiot.

Never miss a chance to attend one of Feith's seminars. *It's a sobering,
chilling experience but you will be a safer pilot because of it. *There
are few accidents where the pilot was not at least a contributing
factor.

I married later in life to a glider PIC-in-training, so there was considerable
disparity in experience levels. I'd known OF Greg Feith from years of
head-shot TV exposures related to local crashes, and saw him once in person at
an in-flight-breakup/winch crash investigation. When I married, I knew he'd
retired from the NTSB, never encountered a reason to mention him to my wife,
and was surprised one day to hear HER mention his name.

She'd attended one of his seminars, for a work-related reason. It'd made a
sufficient impression on her to warrant discussion. I got the same impression
Bill D.'s "...sobering, chilling experience..." just made on me. From her
description, I wished I'd been there too.











There are no secret new accident causes. *It's an informative exercise to
download a couple of years of NTSB glider accident reports and tabulate
them in Excel - something I do every year. *Almost every one will be
pilot error - usually gross error. *Were these 'safe' pilots? It would be
a stretch to say they were. *It only gets complicated if you try to
re-interpret the facts to show the pilot was somehow not responsible.
"Occam's razor" applies.

I guess it all depends what falls under 'pilot error'. I agree that just
about every accident you can blame the pilot, even if his rudder cable
broke for example, after all, he didnt check his rudder cable before the
flight. But how many of us are perfect? Same goes to a recent fatal
accident where the pilot tried to bail out too low, probably due to some
sort of mechanical failure. And a recent mid air, where none of the pilots
saw each other until impact. The NTSB will,of course, determine it was
pilots failure to see each other. Case closed . But is it? It's been
demonstrated over and over that our eyes are not able to detect collision
threat on time. So I wouldn't consider those as true pilot errors, but as
bad luck or outside cause, which happened to safe pilots. And yes, we do
find new ways to kill ourselves. The recent Texas tragedy may reveal one. I
know of other pilots who took a toddler for a flight. I am sure those who
heard about this accident will think twice and hard before doing it again,
and maybe, just maybe, another life will be saved thanks to sharing and
speculating about the cause of this accident.

Ramy

Musing philosophically...

I've no problem - from a PIC's perspective - acknowledging "Fate" accidents
occur. A not terribly uncommon intermountain west example would be wings
coming off firebombers. For all practical purposes, no PIC could be expected
to detect such metal fatigue on a daily pre-flight inspection.

Without meaning to imply "Fate" never has a hand in glider accidents, none
come immediately to mind, though the wing failure that continues reverberating
in the Blanik L-13 world might qualify.

So put me in the category which chooses to believe Joe PIC is a crucial link
in the 'chain of failure' typically associated with aircraft (and glider of
course) accidents. I choose to believe this way NOT by way of inflating
feelings of personal superiority simply because I'm still alive and someone
else is not, but because: a) I believe it (duh), and b) I believe believing so
has very real enhancing effect on my own longevity (so call me selfish).

That said, I also readily admit many, if not most, of the fatal glider
accidents I choose to place in the category 'pilot error' (e.g. spins into the
ground, departures from controlled flight in the landing pattern, OFLs gone
bad) can't be "causally guaranteed" with 100% certainty as such, and often
aren't lacking in 'outside influences' I'd ask anyone who challenges based on
that uncertainty, "So what? The uncertainty is a double-edged sword: neither
of us can know for sure why this or that Joe PIC died." My next question is,
"Is it potentially more safe for YOU or ME - all still-living-pilots - to
assume Joe PIC screwed up fatally, or to assume 'something undefinable' beyond
his control trumped?"

In a perfect world, glider pilots would have access to all the investigative,
informational, disseminational, training and refresher resources presently
taken for granted in the commercial aviation world. In reality, it's up to Joe
Individual Pilot, assisted by all the instructional resources we DO have (FAA
mandated, instructors, peers, books, personal curiosity, software, etc.) to
self-educate. We do the best we can, try to influence others as to the wisdom
of our ways, seek to convey 'why' we think our way is wise, and hopefully
enjoy long and gratifying soaring 'careers.'

I still grieve for some friends and friendly acquaintances who 'somehow
screwed up' piloting gliders, but any human frailties that may have
contributed to their deaths don't diminish who they were in my mind. Call it
putting a human face on otherwise impersonal NTSB accident reports, call it
pure rationalization, call it what you will, I try to use their perceived
gaffes to help improve my chances.

The water bomber pilot certainly knew flying a half century year old
overloaded derelict in severe fire turbulence was "pushing it". That
he chose to do so is part heroics and part something else. Since I'm
sitting in Colorado smelling wildfire smoke I have a particular
appreciation for fire fighting pilots and what they do.

The pilot is responsible because he is the last person in a position
to prevent an accident. Certainly a mechanic SHOULD have checked for
metal fatigue but the pilot is responsible for knowing it actually
happened. If he doesn't know and doesn't check for whatever reason,
he's gambling with his life and his crew's.

A lot of 'outside influences' can add up to an accident but the pilot
is charged with knowing all of them and factoring them into the risk
equation. It's actually in the FAR's (Part 91.103 & 91.9 are two)
They require a pilot to consider anything which could adversely effect
the outcome of a flight.