JJ,

I dont believe your only concern is with a possible
breach of FAR's. If it were you would sit back happy
in the knowledge that you are not breaking the law
and allow everyone else to make up their own mind.

Why do people feel they have to legislate for things
that may never happen? Whats next? Why not ban variometers?
I certainly look at my variometer much more around
the flight than I do when executing a very safe, thought-out
competition finish.

Let people make their own decision.

Owain

A self-confessed fun-a-holic.

At 16:30 02 October 2003, Jj Sinclair wrote:
Hi Casey,
How's that LS-8, I sold you? Your not doing low passes
with it, are you?

Just because we havent had a disastrous accident near
the finish-line, doesn't
mean we never will. I look at the threat it poses.
Many sailplanes headed for
what I call a *scheduled mid-air collision*. What the
hell is that, you ask?
Its the same place (finish-line), Same altitude (50feet),
the only thing
that's not scheduled is the time. We have narrowed
that down by telling
everyone to be back in 3 hours (ups, 3:15 now with
the +15 thing) So now we
have most of the guys coming in low and fast, all headed
for the same spot and
shooting for the same altitude and close to the same
time. The guys are good
aviators and the guys in the nationals are REAL good
aviators, but they are all
focused on the finish line and quite busy; Don't go
below 50 feet, Don't go
above red-line, Dump the water, Don't forget to dump
the tail tank, Don't lose
sight of the guy in front of you, Ups, didn't page
up on the GPS, to get
altitude & distance together. What was that altitude
correction factor? WHOA,
we almost hit the ground, STOP playing with the GPS.
Which way are they
landing? No wind sock out here. Haven't heard anything
on the radio, am I on
the right frequency? There's an AWOS tower out here
somewhere? What's that
shadow moving over me?......................................Crunch
!

I see the collision at Bridgeport as a scheduled mid-air
also. Only in this
case, the last variable was altitude. Both started
at the same time, so
approaching Bridgeport at about the same time isn't
out of the question. The
point was the same, Bridgeport. Chance, or the altitude
gained in the last
thermal (shared?) was the final parameter that was
met on that tragic day.

My real point in the post was, I think we are breaking
FAR's and I think we
should do something about it. Now before all the guard
house lawyers jump me,
allow me some more outlandish statements;

1. The situation I described could be called an Air
Show. The FAA has very
specific rules about what is allowed and where it is
done in an air show. Who
wants to argue (in court) that its not an air show,
its just our way to let our
macho-crocho's display their stuff.

2. Some have said to simply move the finish line. Well,
it must be fairly close
to the runway or we won't be able to get back there
after our low altitude air
show. Besides, the macho-crocho's need an audiance.
Who's going to see them way
out there in the weeds?

3.Some pull-ups I have seen, meet the FAA definition
of aerobatics, and that
opens up a whole new can of whip-ass the Federallies
may bring to bear on our
little contest.

4. If we make the 500' / 1 mile finish cylinder, MANDATORY,
all issues with the
FAR's will be dealt with.
JJ Sinclair