Keep your hand off the release handle during aero tows!

Hi Bill,

Did you read Paul Ruskin's analysis of German and UK winch
launching accidents, which was number 66 in this thread. He
concluded that there was no significant difference between fatal
and serious accident rates between the two countries. I note that
Germany had about 4 accidents that came into the stall and flick
roll category while the UK only had one. Germany has about 5
times as many glider pilots as the UK. About 2/3rd's of UK glider
launches are by winch. As Skylaunch has sold many winches to
Germany and Tost to the UK, I assume that the winches are
similar and give the same rates of acceleration in both countries.

BTW, before we had winches at our club, we used to wire launch
by autotow, where the ground run acceleration was REALLY
slow, at least 10 seconds to lift off. I don't remember there
being any ground loop or cartwheel accidents on take off in that
era.

Derek Copeland

At 17:47 13 October 2013, Bill D wrote:
On Thursday, October 10, 2013 4:05:22 AM UTC-6, Terry
Walsh wrote:
Fred,
=20
=20
=20
I did not intend this as a comment against Americans I know
equally
=20
arrogant people of many different national origins. I was
simply
commenti=
ng
=20
that if this indeed Bill Daniels then he could be considered to
be an
=20
expert on winch operations, but his apparent refusal to
accept any other
=20
opinion than his own was more than a little arrogant.

I've let the UK "echo chamber" run a bit so they can all
congratulate each
=
other for fuzzy thinking.

Arrogant? Indignant and angry are a better words. Every
time you screw
up=
, it has enormous impact outside the UK. When those screw-
ups are based
on=
institutionalized nonsense, and you try to export that
nonsense, it makes
=
me angry. An example is the winch launch section in the 2013
Glider
Flying=
Handbook.

The main source of my guidance isn't from the US, or my own
imagination,
i=
t's the German SDO Segelflugbetriebsordnung. It contains
about the best
inf=
ormation on winch launch safety available.

The US stands accused of "doing few winch launches". That's
true.
Compare=
d to the roughly one million annual launches in Germany, the
UK doesn't do
=
many either. That, and their superb safety record, makes
Germany a far
bet=
ter source of safety information.

If you want an educational approach, read my thoughts on the
acceleration
p=
hase and acceleration induced uncommanded rotation.
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/...Acceleration.p
df