It has always seemed to me that the sport and recreation of soaring has always been relatively unknown outside the society of people who are all into aviation. I wonder how many people happen to stumble upon videos like Bruno's and Ramy's, other than those of us who go actively looking for them, and those who hear of them from us. It's not mentioned much in any mass media, for example, in contrast to, e.g., ice skating or even skydiving.

I myself first learned about soaring at the age of 15, and got interested, via a great article in National Geographic in 1967 (January or February issue, I think, but I'm not sure), with lots of pictures of course. My father then took me out to Dillingham Field (Oahu) for a glider ride. (In a 2-32!).

Fast forward about 10 years. Now out of college and fully employed, I started lessons at Sky Sailing, Fremont, 1975. But if it hadn't been for (a) that Nat Geo article and (b) a friend in college who was all into it, I might never have heard of gliders or sailplanes or soaring to this day.

Back in the 1960's or 1970's, Cessna had a major public advertising campaign, the gist (and slogan) of which was "If you can drive, you can fly!". But I never saw a similar publicity campaign to make soaring better known to the public. How about "If you can swim, you can soar!"

-- J. J.
======================