On Friday, March 7, 2014 7:47:33 AM UTC-8, John Carlyle wrote:
Kirk,



Thanks for your detailed answer. I understand what you're saying - be flexible and be prepared to do what you gotta do when you gotta do it.



I tend to make mistakes when I rush, so I try to keep ahead of the situation. During landings I do this by using the typical downwind-base-final pattern. It doesn't always work out, of course, during BFRs it's common for me to get a release on tow and hear the instructor say "where you going to land now"? That practice has helped immensely with the problems you mentioned of being in a gaggle of gliders all trying to land now, or needing to make a quick change of farmers field when the first choice had to be ruled out.



-John, Q3



On Wednesday, March 5, 2014 11:03:59 PM UTC-5, kirk.stant wrote:

On Wednesday, March 5, 2014 12:08:55 PM UTC-6, John Carlyle wrote:

Thank for writing that - very interesting that you mix approach types..



My experience is that you can never be sure that you will be able to fly a "textbook" pattern, so better to be comfortable in a variety of situations. It's a matter of getting your glider from where it is to short final to your desired landing area, at a safe speed and altitude for the existing conditions. Patterns are guides - but one can land safely from all sorts of patterns; one can also (as we are proving) crash from "textbook" patterns..



I'm not too clear about your comment "always flying the same pattern into the same airfield pretty much guarantees that your first landout will be exciting". I always use a downwind-base-final pattern, I've logged 10 landouts in farmers fields, and except for having to dodge an electric wire fence once they were low or no drama events (although some of the retrieves were interesting).



If you have the luxury of large fields and plenty of time, then setting up a "standard" pattern is always a good option - but what if you don't have those options? You may find on base that the field you picked is not landable, or the wind changes 180 degrees due to a gust front; you may be following a valley and have to suddenly land in that field on your left; or you may get back to your own field and be in a gaggle of gliders all vying for the same runway at the same time. Most of my landouts have been benign also - but I've also done a couple of final glides into fields that I couldn't see and the pattern consisted of one turn, gear & flaps down, and land. I think you have to be prepared for these kinds of eventualities, and be able to fly your glider safely when low and stressed. That takes planning and practice.



Your "de-stabilized" (non-constant airspeed) approach comment was also interesting. I tend to keep high until on final, just to keep my options open, but my speed stays pretty much constant. Being high has helped me on several occasions to delay a bit (once a person behind me with no radio landed under me, another time someone drove onto the field). Do I understand correctly that you tend to keep your energy in speed rather than altitude?



Energy is the key, high and fast is nice, lower and fast is OK, but slow and low is never good until over the threshold! I see my "hot" pattern speed as a minimum and if it gets a bit high I don't worry about it - final is a fine time to decelerate and get ready to land. Again, it depends on the situation - if there are lots of gliders around trying to land, then playing off altitude and speed is a useful tool to use to get sequenced into the flow - and extra speed on final is good unless you KNOW you have to land short! If there is nothing going on and it's the last landing of the day, then a perfect, constant speed pattern is a fun challenge; but if it's a hectic arrival, I may have to maneuver aggressively to get down; then speed control is more of the "stay fast, stay fast, stay fast..." variety until the immediate problem of where to go is solved. Stall/spins make lousy pattern entries!



Cheers,

Kirk

66

Last Saturday - on downwind - have called pattern on radio - getting ready to turn base (squared off pattern), when I notice tow plane has maybe decided I was just kidding about landing, and touches down on runway - bless his heart - or maybe didn't hear my radio calls. Start turn to base, watching yaw string and speed and runway and tow. I know the ground is still there, but I have to know how cluttered or clear it is. I'm on TLAR so altimeter doesn't really matter at this point. Just know I can still land long or short, but have to decide pretty quickly which, unless tow clears runway. There are three gliders staged on left third of runway (we have a wide dirt runway), and tow is taxiing toward them on right side of runway, so runway is now blocked and my original aim point is meaningless - would hit tow, and if I try to miss tow by going left, I'll hit the staged gliders. If I go right of tow, I'm into the desert and a severely damaged glider. As I turn final, I keep altitude and air speed for either landing short or landing way, way long. Don't like either option, since that's a long push to my trailer, but I gotta fly the glider and be safe - a long push to trailer is better than the other options at this point. Since it's a gusty day, need extra airspeed anyway. Tow is now about even with staged gliders, runway is totally blocked, and I have run out of time. Since it's a gusty day, I don't want to chance getting knocked down (wind shear) trying to land long by flying over everyone, so opt for short and deploy full air brakes and get ready to start a slip since I'm planning on touching down about 400' - 500' shorter than original plan. Still watching airspeed, since I don't want to land short and still end up rolling into the ground gaggle because of too much ground speed. About 1 second later, tow pulls in front of gliders, clearing the right side of the runway, so I go back to original plan. In come the brakes, up comes the nose a bit and I touch down as originally planned. What wingtips? Never saw them. What was I focused on? Just about everything I thought was important, but primarily on landing safely.
Eric Bick