Stay in, or get out?

I don't understand the NOAH system. Why not just put a ballistic recovery
chute in the glider? That way you don't need to worry about getting out,
you are somewhat protected when you hit the ground, and your chute will
deploy even if you pull the cord at 300 ft.

Mike Schumann

"Bill Daniels" bildan@comcast-dot-net wrote in message
. ..

"bagmaker" wrote in message
...

-
You've had a whack, but everything feels fine. Do you
stay in the
glider, or leave? Just how reliable are the parachutes
we use? I
understand that they're fairly simple quick-opening
designs, but
there's no reserve, right? Has a glider-pilot parachute
ever failed?


Dan

-

Dan,
Simply, there is no blanket answer, way too many variables exist.
Derek Piggot writes a fascinating account of his bail-out in some of his
gliding books, I would suggest reading them.
Gliding Kiwi has a great article this month on a NZ instructor landing a
rudderless puch with a PAX - more heart stopping reading!

Basically if it does fly after a hit, check to see that it will keep
flying with some harsh movements -height limits withstanding- long enough
to land. Landing manuevering can be rough, you want to be sure the thing
doesnt fail at 100 feet after nursing down from a good bail out height.

Rough rule has been bandied about RAS about 1500 ft as a minimum bail-out
altitude, many would disagree, but if you dont have a choice.....

Bottom line is you are worth more than a glider, if in doubt, get out

fly safe
Bagger

I've twice faced the decision to jump or land a crippled glider. The
first was a Pratt-Read badly damaged from a mid-air. I had fresh jump
training, a fresh repack and a stable jump platform but I decided to land
it anyway. The critical decision was whether I could control the glider
from the time it decended below a safe jump altitude until it was on the
ground. I could and did. For the record, the other pilot in the mid-air
did the same thing.

The second was an experimental flying wing where a suposedly secure lead
shot bag shifted in flight so as to jam the elevator/aileron bellcranks.
I found I could steer with rudder and slow it to 70Kts with trim. That
let me hit the runway on a fast, shallow glide. It was a rough landing
but the glider and I survived to fly again.

In both cases there was intense discussion post flight about the wisdom of
my decisions. A slim majority said the conservative action was to have
abandoned ship. My view was if the thing is more or less controllable,
and you have a big airfield to aim at, land it. If it is an airplane
loaded with fuel, that might shift the decision toward jumping. However,
a glider that can be flown to hit a large flat area at a shallow angle is
likely to be safer than the 'chute. If there is any doubt that the glider
will remain controllable - jump.

The real problem here is struggling to rise from a reclining position and
crawl over the side with a 15 pound 'chute on your back. That's
difficult. Being old, out of shape and/or overweight makes it impossible.
This is where the NOAH system from DG is so significant. Of all the
safety related things that one could spend money on, the NOAH system tops
the list for me.

Bill Daniels




--
Posted via a free Usenet account from http://www.teranews.com

Add:

Gear warning system $20
Condom $1.50

"Eric Greenwell" wrote in message
news:aZCFi.2495$rw3.2350@trndny04...
Bill Daniels wrote:

The real problem here is struggling to rise from a reclining position and
crawl over the side with a 15 pound 'chute on your back. That's
difficult. Being old, out of shape and/or overweight makes it impossible.
This is where the NOAH system from DG is so significant. Of all the
safety related things that one could spend money on, the NOAH system tops
the list for me.

It would be interesting to construct a list of these things, and
prioritize them by their cost/benefit ratio. Bill seems like a very safety
conscious pilot, so he probably is at the point where a NOAH system would
give him the most safety increase for the buck. I'll bet a lot, maybe
most, pilots aren't in that situation.

A simple example is the Roeger hook (or a variant) that is part of every
new glider with a forward opening canopy, ensuring it can be jettisoned
safely. DG makes a retrofit available for all their older gliders, yet
relatively few have purchased one. I know Schleicher offers retrofits for
at least one glider (I bought and installed one), and perhaps others.

How many pilots have a "spoilers open during takeoff" warning? I believe
more pilots have died because of this than those that couldn't bail out of
a glider because the G forces were to great.

Here's a start on a safety equipment list, ordered by cost/benefit:

A list for the *Serious Cross-Country Pilot*

"spoilers open on takeoff" warning ($100)
parachute ($1200)
Roeger hook ($600 - my cost)
PCAS transponder detector ($450)
Transponder ($3000)
NOAH ($5000)
ELT ($1000 - 406 hz unit)
PLB ($200 - $500)

My list reflects my situation. I'm sure there should probably be several
lists that account for where you fly and the kind of flying you do. What
do other pilots think this list should include, where would you place
things in the list, and what pilots is it intended for?

--
Eric Greenwell - Washington State, USA
* Change "netto" to "net" to email me directly
* "Transponders in Sailplanes" http://tinyurl.com/y739x4
* "A Guide to Self-launching Sailplane Operation" at www.motorglider.org

On Tue, 11 Sep 2007 20:34:14 +0000, Eric Greenwell wrote:

Here's a start on a safety equipment list, ordered by cost/benefit:

A list for the *Serious Cross-Country Pilot*

"spoilers open on takeoff" warning ($100)
parachute ($1200)
Roeger hook ($600 - my cost)
PCAS transponder detector ($450)
Transponder ($3000)
NOAH ($5000)
ELT ($1000 - 406 hz unit)
PLB ($200 - $500)

My list reflects my situation. I'm sure there should probably be several
lists that account for where you fly and the kind of flying you do. What
do other pilots think this list should include, where would you place
things in the list, and what pilots is it intended for?

The obvious omission:

Flarm (US $400 - $500). My first hand experience is that in terms of
cost/benefit, it belongs up with the chute, maybe even above it. Even if
you are fortunate enough not to need one of these devices, remember it
also offers protection for the other pilot who might not see you.

It is time someone developed a version that is accepted world wide and can
be fitted to power aircraft as well, while keeping the costs "VFR
affordable".


Ian

"Mike Schumann" wrote in message
.. .
I don't understand the NOAH system. Why not just put a ballistic recovery
chute in the glider? That way you don't need to worry about getting out,
you are somewhat protected when you hit the ground, and your chute will
deploy even if you pull the cord at 300 ft.

Mike Schumann

Mike, I think this is still open to debate. I have stated that I have an
aversion to landing in a sitting position with no crush structure under me.
The Cirrus SR22 uses the landing gear which punches up through the wing to
absorb impact. A glider doesn't have that. However, I'm going to keep an
open mind.

There is a strange dynamic going on with the existing ballistic 'chute
systems. There have been a lot of deployments - a lot more than anyone
thought there would be. On one side the proponents say the system is
working. On the other side, detractors say many of the deployments were
unneccessary.

One theory is that many pilots fly in a state of near panic. Give them a
panic button and they'll push it. If no panic button, they'll just fly back
and land. If this is true, insurance claims are going to skyrocket for
ballistic 'chute equipped aircraft.

Bill Daniels

There are some good article on the DG web site about
safety features, they do explain why they went for
the NOAH system. given the cost and structural issues
with balistic recorery systems and the life of plastic
gliders (50-100 years?) it would be a very long time
before many people had one. I dont think they can cope
with water ballast (200kg+ in newer 15/18m)

80-90% of new German gliders have an engine, so space
and the extra weight are also issues, even turbos reduce
weak weather perfformance

the Noah can be retrofitted to a lot of the existing
DG fleet and is not prohibitively expensive. To be
fair it is also more likely to give DG a return on
the investment. The system will only work with a mushroom
type instrument binnacle or similar which you legs
can get round either side

the reaon for the Noah is why i would lean toward using
the stable platform. Some test were done a while ago
to simulate bailout with spin G loading by strapping
weights to pilots of various ages, and seing if they
could roll out of a static cockpit, the older ones
simply could not get out of the cockpit

as for the airbrake open warning DG also make the Piggot
Hook, which is a sawtooth plate which catches the airbrake
handle if it trys to slide back when not locked, could
easily be copied and retrofitted to lots of types,
especially in Experemental world.

Pete

At 21:01 11 September 2007, Mike Schumann wrote:
I don't understand the NOAH system. Why not just put
a ballistic recovery
chute in the glider? That way you don't need to worry
about getting out,
you are somewhat protected when you hit the ground,
and your chute will
deploy even if you pull the cord at 300 ft.

Mike Schumann

'Bill Daniels' wrote in message
...

'bagmaker' wrote in message
...

-
You've had a whack, but everything feels fine. Do
you
stay in the
glider, or leave? Just how reliable are the parachutes
we use? I
understand that they're fairly simple quick-opening
designs, but
there's no reserve, right? Has a glider-pilot parachute
ever failed?


Dan

-

Dan,
Simply, there is no blanket answer, way too many variables
exist.
Derek Piggot writes a fascinating account of his bail-out
in some of his
gliding books, I would suggest reading them.
Gliding Kiwi has a great article this month on a NZ
instructor landing a
rudderless puch with a PAX - more heart stopping reading!

Basically if it does fly after a hit, check to see
that it will keep
flying with some harsh movements -height limits withstanding-
long enough
to land. Landing manuevering can be rough, you want
to be sure the thing
doesnt fail at 100 feet after nursing down from a
good bail out height.

Rough rule has been bandied about RAS about 1500 ft
as a minimum bail-out
altitude, many would disagree, but if you dont have
a choice.....

Bottom line is you are worth more than a glider, if
in doubt, get out

fly safe
Bagger

I've twice faced the decision to jump or land a crippled
glider. The
first was a Pratt-Read badly damaged from a mid-air.
I had fresh jump
training, a fresh repack and a stable jump platform
but I decided to land
it anyway. The critical decision was whether I could
control the glider
from the time it decended below a safe jump altitude
until it was on the
ground. I could and did. For the record, the other
pilot in the mid-air
did the same thing.

The second was an experimental flying wing where a
suposedly secure lead
shot bag shifted in flight so as to jam the elevator/aileron
bellcranks.
I found I could steer with rudder and slow it to 70Kts
with trim. That
let me hit the runway on a fast, shallow glide. It
was a rough landing
but the glider and I survived to fly again.

In both cases there was intense discussion post flight
about the wisdom of
my decisions. A slim majority said the conservative
action was to have
abandoned ship. My view was if the thing is more
or less controllable,
and you have a big airfield to aim at, land it. If
it is an airplane
loaded with fuel, that might shift the decision toward
jumping. However,
a glider that can be flown to hit a large flat area
at a shallow angle is
likely to be safer than the 'chute. If there is any
doubt that the glider
will remain controllable - jump.

The real problem here is struggling to rise from a
reclining position and
crawl over the side with a 15 pound 'chute on your
back. That's
difficult. Being old, out of shape and/or overweight
makes it impossible.
This is where the NOAH system from DG is so significant.
Of all the
safety related things that one could spend money on,
the NOAH system tops
the list for me.

Bill Daniels




--
Posted via a free Usenet account from http://www.teranews.com

At 21:01 11 September 2007, Mike Schumann wrote:
I don't understand the NOAH system. Why not just put
a ballistic recovery
chute in the glider? That way you don't need to worry
about getting out,
you are somewhat protected when you hit the ground,
and your chute will
deploy even if you pull the cord at 300 ft.

Mike Schumann

1. Not all gliders can have a BRS installed (probably
goes for the NOAH as well)
2. With a BRS, you can not guarantee you will still
be attached to the part of the glider with the BRS
installed, nor that it will function properly in the
case of catastrophic damage

Even if you have the BRS, I highly recommend still
flying with your emergency bailout chute, and please
continue to 'worry' about how you may get out if you
need to. If the BRS works- hey, great! If not you still
have an option (not below 300 AGL though) There is
already a known case of this very scenario, and it
was a flutter breakup and not even a midair that caused
it. Skillfully (not luckily cause' it's not called
luck when you prepare for the unexpected) the pilot
had his personal chute (and presence of mind) and was
able to live to tell about it. Plus with a personal
chute you can steer away form power lines or cliff
faces and other hazards just as deadly as no protection
at all.
For the really safety minded (and thick walleted) a
BRS, NOAH, a personal chute, a helmet (might have saved
more lives than you may think) and all the other gizmos
mentioned already, including the condom, although admittedly
the helmet may significantly reduce the need for that
one

Paul Hanson
"Do the usual, unusually well"--Len Niemi

My gut feeling is that one of the more likely scenarios is a mid-air at or
near pattern altitude. When you are this low, I doubt you have time to bail
out, whether you have NOAH or not. This is where only a Balistic Recovery
Chute can save your butt.

Mike Schumann

"Paul Hanson" wrote in message
...
At 21:01 11 September 2007, Mike Schumann wrote:
I don't understand the NOAH system. Why not just put
a ballistic recovery
chute in the glider? That way you don't need to worry
about getting out,
you are somewhat protected when you hit the ground,
and your chute will
deploy even if you pull the cord at 300 ft.

Mike Schumann

1. Not all gliders can have a BRS installed (probably
goes for the NOAH as well)
2. With a BRS, you can not guarantee you will still
be attached to the part of the glider with the BRS
installed, nor that it will function properly in the
case of catastrophic damage

Even if you have the BRS, I highly recommend still
flying with your emergency bailout chute, and please
continue to 'worry' about how you may get out if you
need to. If the BRS works- hey, great! If not you still
have an option (not below 300 AGL though) There is
already a known case of this very scenario, and it
was a flutter breakup and not even a midair that caused
it. Skillfully (not luckily cause' it's not called
luck when you prepare for the unexpected) the pilot
had his personal chute (and presence of mind) and was
able to live to tell about it. Plus with a personal
chute you can steer away form power lines or cliff
faces and other hazards just as deadly as no protection
at all.
For the really safety minded (and thick walleted) a
BRS, NOAH, a personal chute, a helmet (might have saved
more lives than you may think) and all the other gizmos
mentioned already, including the condom, although admittedly
the helmet may significantly reduce the need for that
one

Paul Hanson
"Do the usual, unusually well"--Len Niemi





--
Posted via a free Usenet account from http://www.teranews.com

bumper wrote:
This bag would probably be made of coated nylon and be inflated with an
easily refillable compressed air bottle. Inflation would be via a
quarter-turn manual valve with no safety devices except perhaps a manual
interlock pin (if a solenoid valve were used, a canopy-open interlock could
be incorporated). The intent would be to design the "air-lift under cushion"
for ground use only, to assist the pilot in exiting the ship. If this system
were marketed, restricting it to ground use would hopefully help eliminate
the liability concerns of a system intended to assist a bail out.

A friend of mine (Bob Moore) had an "elderly pilot's assist" (not that
I'm suggesting bumper is elderly, since I'm a bit older myself!)
installed in his PIK 20 E. He used it to enter and exit the glider on
the ground. It was a cloth bag with (I think) two aircraft tire tubes,
one on top of the other, inside the bag. A small 12 VDC pump run from
the glider battery inflated the tubes to raise the pilot; a valve
released the air to lower the pilot. It allowed him another couple years
of flying.

--
Eric Greenwell - Washington State, USA
* Change "netto" to "net" to email me directly
* "Transponders in Sailplanes" http://tinyurl.com/y739x4
* "A Guide to Self-launching Sailplane Operation" at www.motorglider.org

Thanks for all your replies. I think this is something to think about
*before* it happens to you (and it can - a good friend was hit earlier
this year, he landed safely minus some 40% of his DG's tailplane. He
didn't know it had gone until he landed). I also agree that the use of
FLARM is a no-brainer - oddly, there's still resistance to it in some
quarters.

On Sep 12, 5:08 am, "Mike Schumann" mike-nos...@traditions-
nospam.com wrote:
My gut feeling is that one of the more likely scenarios is a mid-air at or
near pattern altitude. When you are this low, I doubt you have time to bail
out, whether you have NOAH or not. This is where only a Balistic Recovery
Chute can save your butt.

Last year in Britain there was a mid-air at "1,500' above the
airfield". One pilot left through a hole in his canopy resulting from
the collision. If I remember correctly, eye-witnesses said the fairly
old parachute he was using opened remarkably quickly, and the pilot
survived. The other pilot, flying a ASW19, appears to have been unable
to jettison his canpoy as the PDA and logger cables had been cable
tied to the frame.

http://www.aaib.dft.gov.uk/cms_resou...0and%20GDP.pdf


Dan

On Sep 11, 7:01 am, Dan G wrote:
You've had a whack, but everything feels fine. Do you stay in the
glider, or leave? Just how reliable are the parachutes we use? I
understand that they're fairly simple quick-opening designs, but
there's no reserve, right? Has a glider-pilot parachute ever failed?

Dan

Dan,
I had the unfortunate experience of having to leave my glider in
January after a mid air. The other glider had impacted my left wing
and severed it about half a metre from the root,and also broke the
tail boom midway between the wing and the tail. He was able to land
but I had to make a quick exit, which was my first parachuting
experience. I had no doubts that I would have to jump, and previous
training and preparation took over.
The glider had started a spin to the left and it took some time to
get rid of the canopy (PUSH on it after you activate the releases!),
but I was actually surprised how easy it was to get out of the
cockpit. Having undone the harness it seemed like no trouble at all to
just roll over the canopy rail and out into the wild blue yonder. I
have a below knee artificial right leg so I had considered this
scenario for some time, expecting to have a lot of trouble just
getting my leg past the instrument panel, but no, it was really a
piece of cake. I put it down to the fact the gravitational force was
less as the glider was diving and all I had to do was push away from
it. A NOAH sytem would have been redundant I feel. Luckily, the spin
hadn't developed to the stage where the centrifugal forces were high,
even though it had seemed to take forever to get out; in fact it was
probably only seconds.
The chute worked as advertised (it had been repacked 2 months
previously), opening in 3 seconds (or so it seemed) and there was no
way I was going to do any stabilising. I used that ripcord as soon as
I could. Adrenalin does amazing things. I was upside down when the
chute opened, but the shock of it soon had me the right way up. I did
get some pretty severe bruising around the groin and shoulders, but I
was alive and thats what counted. Then there was the landing. I
couldn't see the ground properly because the shock of the opening
chute ripped my glasses off, and I hit before I was ready, and I hit
very heavily, once again with absolutely no proper tecnique, but I was
alive.
As far as I am concerned everything worked and the end result was
good. I just hope no one else has to try out their parachute.

Phil