Understand. Thanks for telling your story.

I had a glider get so far out of position once (high and outside the
turn) that, as I was reaching for the release, he dived across my tail,
wrapping the rope around the wing of his borrowed HP-14. The wing was
cut, top and bottom, all the way to the spar. He didn't even realize
what he'd done until that evening he when he asked for help derigging.
I was invited to come over and have a look.

Dan

On 5/3/2015 5:50 PM, Jim David wrote:
On Friday, May 1, 2015 at 10:37:05 AM UTC-4, Dan Marotta wrote:
Jim,



Did you wave him off or drop the rope? Ropes and rings are
expensive!

Dan Marotta
Hi Dan,

My situation was pretty violent. It was a botched attempt at steering. There were two very strong tugs to my left, one after another. After the second wallop, I was convinced that the glider pilot thought he had released and was executing his clearing turn (we were near the release altitude).

I personally know two tow pilots that have been the recipient of clearing turns after the glider pilot _thought_ they had released and both tow pilots ended up standing on the rudder peddles. One wound up in an inverted spin.

I didn't want to give the glider pilot a third try, so I released them.
The instructor was smart enough to return to the airport with the rope.

I've never been yanked that hard, even in wave turbulence.
Believe me, they deserved the rope.

Regards,
Jim


--
Dan Marotta