Earlier, Jim Willson wrote:

Even though I'd be quite capable of doing it, I'll never build a kit
airplane. Call me a wimp, but I've assembled too many bicycles on
Christmas morning to think that I could be 100% correct in building an
airplane. And for what?! A thrill. The pride to say, "Look what I
did!" I wonder what the kids will say about their daddy. I'm sure he
spent hours at the hanger instead of with them. Perhaps they sat at the
hanger watching him asking him annoying questions so that they could at
least get his attention. I'm sure he made many promises to spend more
time with them when the plane was finished.

We spend so many hours of our lives chasing after the temporal things of
this world, (i.e. hobbies, work, a name, a reputation). We never spend
time chasing after the things that will count when we're gone (the
character of our family) or those things eternal.

I grieve for this family. What a waste!

It would be difficult address all of these points to the appropriate
depth. However, I will make a couple of observations and suggestions
on behalf of homebuilt aviation:

Everybody who endeavors to partake of homebuilding should read Tom
Wolfe's _The Right Stuff_. Or, if you're too busy, watch the movie
twice through; it's sort of a condensed shorthand for the main themes
of the movie. Here's what I think you should take away from the
experience:

Flying is generally sort of safe, but it is inherently unforgiving.
Especially when you are doing things that are untested or in uncharted
territory, unexpected things may happen. They may happen quickly and
brutally.

Everything you do in aviation has risks, and you must carefully
balance your obligations to your family and friends against those
risks.

However, you must also balance these same obligations against the
absence of risks, for without risk you cannot advance in either your
personal or professional lives. Just as the unexamined life is not
worth living, nor is the unlived life worth examining.

The accident in question happened at an airport where a lot of my kit
sailplane development is happening. I've been there with my family
several times, and I've flown there with my daughter in a small
airplane. I've stood in the hangars there and addressed audiences to
tell them that my project is behind schedule, and that it is so
because I'm spending time with my family rather than in the shop.

And yet part of why I do these crazy things, think up these crazy
systems and mechanisms, and handle crazy materials, is for my family.
I want my daughters to know that dreams are more than pictures inside
your head. Dreams can be expressed with your hands and be made real.
You have to choose your dreams carefully, and express them with care
and precision that does not come naturally to dreamers. But dreams
they are, and real they can become.

Sons and daughters don't learn these dream lessons from television.
They don't learn it from their Nintendo. They can sort of get the idea
from school, although only in a pale shadowy form. They learn them
best by doing them, and they learn the idea of the doing from seeing
it done. And they must learn that dreams are inherently risky, but
that risks can and must be managed.

Exploring the risk management aspect a bit further, I have to ask
myself, would I do the things that this pilot seems to have done? I
think that the answer would be no in many aspects.

Would I test my new airplane on a swaybacked mountainside airport with
narrow pavement, 6500 foot density altitude and relatively few
alternate landing sites? I think I would not. I would rather choose a
flatland ex-military airport with acres of tarmac and abundant
options. Especially if one was right down the highway.

Would I start testing my new airplane with a single launch and
takeoff? I think I would not. I would rather approach takeoff speed
progressively on many runs over a period of days or weeks. The actual
first takeoff would hopefully seem to be an anticlimactic
afterthought.

Would I start testing my new airplane with friends and family
watching? I think I would not. I have know too many such events to go
awry. Be it stage fright, performance anxiety, or whatever you'd call
it, Heisenberg's principle dictates that watchers cannot but influence
the outcome. I would rather make my test program start so early in the
morning, and be so inherently boring, that those few who came to watch
would wander off after the first three or four hours.

Would I start testing my new airplane with no recent time in a similar
type? I think I would not. I would rather either refresh my flying
skills, or get someone else who is more qualified.

Those are just my few thoughts on the matter at hand.

Thanks, and best regards to all

Bob K.
http://www.hpaircraft.com/hp-24