The truth about Flarm Stealth and Competition definition...

Well, I've now deleted two posts where I got overly irritated at Sean for his "weak assed" comments and insinuations that those of us who are concerned about safety aren't really, we're just not "real men" and can't fly without help. Sheesh Sean!

And then comes along Andy Blackburn with an eloquent, well written, logical argument that makes any continuation of those sorts of "I'm tougher than you", "you're a wimp and I'm a real man", hopefully look as weak as they are.. Thank you, Andy. I haven't met you (I don't think), but look forward to doing so.

And for what it's worth, I personally couldn't care less about leaching. Or about winning a contest - and I suspect there are a lot like me. I get to fly 1 or 2 contests a year because of my job. One of my main aims is to maximize the chance of leaving that contest alive. It's yet another group that I hope the RC considers - us amateurs who do this not for the glory, not for the hope of standing on some wooden pedestal holding a tin trophy, but for the fun of hanging out, safely, with our friends. Pretty weak-assed, but there it is.

I still remember an elderly gentleman (no longer with us) missing me by about 20 feet some 17 years ago at Newcastle as he went straight through my thermal at 100 mph. I swear I saw his eyes... And he still didn't see me as he went by. I'll fully admit that I was so focused on centering that I didn't see him coming either. Anything - absolutely anything - that I can do to not repeat that little bit of fun is great with me. And I suspect that if the same gentleman had a device that gave him 60 seconds warning, he'd still be searching around trying to find where the warning was coming from me as he smacked into me. A few minutes sounds a lot nicer to me than 60 seconds, thank you very much.