Private airport or small field for landout?

On Mon, 25 May 2020 17:01:29 -0700, MNLou wrote:

I use Google Earth to confirm private strips in my database whenever
possible.

I do exactly the same - its an easy and quick way to look over fields you
have the lat/lon for and decide whether its worth going to look at the
field.

You can zoom right in too, making it easy to use the ruler tool to
measure runway lengths and widths to +/- 3ft and to see what type of
surface the field has. Some Microlite strips are even narrower than light
aircraft strips.

Other suggestions:

- avoid landing in fields containing animals, both to avoid annoying
the farmer and because even a sheep or goat bolting across in front of
a landing glider could spoil your day

- a field with three straight edges and one meandering, possibly lush
edge probably slopes toward the meandering edge (could be a stream)
and you don't want to be landing along or toward the stream if there's
much slope on the field

- if a field changes colour along a straight line without an visible
fence line, bewa electric fence, which can take your head off if
you hit it.

- if a power line crosses a field you're more likely to see tufts of
grass round the poles than to line itself


--
Martin | martin at
Gregorie | gregorie dot org

You definitely want to check the photo date in Google Earth to determine whether the image is even remotely current. The last photo of Moriarty was taken March 26, 2016.

On Mon, 25 May 2020 20:39:35 -0700, markmocho53 wrote:

You definitely want to check the photo date in Google Earth to determine
whether the image is even remotely current. The last photo of Moriarty
was taken March 26, 2016.

Agreed - and sometimes there's no obvious reason why the dates of nearby
places differ as much as they do, though sometimes obvious colour changes
make it clear that they were covered during different flights. This can
be quite obvious with your viewpoint at 5000-10000m (15,000 - 30,000 ft)
above ground level.


--
Martin | martin at
Gregorie | gregorie dot org

You should not be relying on any prior knowledge of the strip.

Arrange to do some filed landing practice with an instructor in a motor
glider. Fly around, look at fields, learn what to look for and what to
avoid.
Practice some engine idol approaches and then power and fly away.


When yo start your xc career you can expect to land out. You should be
always looking at the general area you are over, when lower more of your
workload capacity will be diverted to this.

When you need to land, pick a field with sufficient time to overfly and
plan
your circuit. Once committed ... you are committed and need to land. Don't

get temped by weal lift in the circuit.

Flying in the UK with our lack of weather, we get pretty adept to field
landings!

Have fun, stay safe.