Saturday practice at Hobbs NM

I have flown with Flarm but do not yet have it fitted to my own glider
which I use in Nationals competition.

When flying XC in a Duo last year I nearly had a head on despite both
gliders being equipped with Flarm. I did not see the threat until too
late and I do not believe the other piot saw me as he took no avoiding
action. How can this be?

We were both flying at cruising speeds (closing at over 160kts) and
intercepted a short energy line from an angle of about 30 degrees. I
turned left onto the energy, he also turned left onto it but from the
other end. As I turned left the Flarm indicated a threat just left of
centre and below. Naturally I looked in that direction. This was my
mistake. The Flarm did not warn again and when I did see the threat it
was coming from my right. We had been flying towards each other with a
little lateral seperation and about 100ft vertically. He had now
turned right back onto track. My guess is that he was originally
warned that I was on his left as well and that was the way he was
looking. If this was the case he may have assumed that turning right
was OK.

This may be an isolated case but it says to me "If you fit Flarm keep
looking out and don't only look where it tells you to!".

I haven't flown in competition with Flarm but my experience includes
sharing thermals with up to 30 other gliders at a time - sometimes in
multiple cores with different bank angles and circle diameters. The
only way to avoid a collision is to look out all the time and fly
defensively. Flarm would only be a distraction in these circumstances.

I am afraid I am far from convinced of Flarms usefulness in either of
these cases.

Finally, in the UK Flarm is not compulsory in competition. Indeed our
rules expressly forbid exchange of data so Flarm has to be switched to
competition mode if used (and you know how to do it). I think this is
a mistake. If pilots were able to use the plane spotting features of
Flarm in competition it would be a definite advantage to fit it, and
all ambitious competition pilots would - including me despite my
reservations.

Jim